










m:^ 



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Qass. 
Book. 



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OF 










TOGETHER WITH THE 



Opinions of Old Jonathan Faneuil 



ON 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 



BY A DELEGATE TO 'THE NATIONAL WHIG CONVENTION. 



S , PHILADELPHIA: 

5 • • 1848. 



/ 

OPINIONS 

OF 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL 



ON Y^J 



illoDcru politics in tl)c Hnitcb States* 



WITH A COMMENTARY 



ENTITLED 



THE GROANS OF UNCLE SAM. 



" Sliall we weep or laugh ? Melhinks either might be done in Inne." 

> Old Play. 



BY 

A DELEGATE TO THE NATIONAL WHIG CONVENTION. 



'^ ^ ♦ ^" t^ " 



PHILADELPHIA 



(6/ 



J^f 






OPINIONS 

X% . OF 

OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 



CHAPTER I. 



INTRODUCTORY. 



There lived in the State of Mar3dand an old gentleman 
Jonathan Faneuil by name, who had numbered upwards of 
three-score years and ten, and v/ho, during his whole life, had 
been much respected by all those who knew him. He had 
never been what is commonly called a politician ; that is to say, 
he had never acted a public part in the pohtical disputes which 
agitated the country during his time, and had never sought 
and never accepted an office of any kind from any party. 
He was a quiet, unobtrusive sort of man, attending diligently 
to his own business, but keeping himself well informed of 
the progress of events in his own country and over the world, 
and never failing to give his vote whenever an election took 
place. There were few persons who knew more than he did 
about the history of this country, and he was one da)'' asked 
why it was that he read so much, and yet never ran for an 
office. "I hold an office," said the old man; "an office 
which I inherited in common with my fellow-citizens. Accord- 
ing to the happy constitution under which we live, the people 
are the Government, and the President and the Congress are 
their agents, appointed by them to transact their business. 
It is as necessary for the employer to be a wise and prudent 
man, as it is for the agent, and as I am constantly called on to 
exercise acts of sovereignty and wish to remain a sovereign, 
I deem it proper to keep myself accurately informed of the 
wants and interests of the country which I help to govern. 
Will not the affairs of an ignorant, Avicked, and stupid ruler 



4 OPINIONS OF 

soon go to ruin ? We, the people, rule in this country, and if 
we do not make a wise and virtuous exercise of our authority, 
the country must suffer and our power pass into other hands." 
Such was the character of the old man, who, when he felt 
the weight of years growing heavy upon him, called together 
his household and his descendants to give them his blessing. 
He had many children, grandchildren, and great-grandchil- 
dren, all of whom loved and reverenced him, and regulated 
their conduct by his advice. They were gathered round 
him in the hall of his house, and he sat in his great arm- 
chair and discoursed to them for some time about their various 
employments, and about morals and religion. Finally he got 
upon the subject of politics, in regard to which he spoke 
what is related in the following chapters. 



CHAPTER II. 

ORIGIN AND DEFINITION OF THE WORD WHIG. 

" One of my httle grandsons," said the old man, " asked me 
the other day what was meant by the word Whig, and now 
I will tell you as far as I know. 

" Most of you are aware that there once sat on the throne 
of England, a race of kings called the Stuarts, the most 
famous of which, in political history, were the two Charleses 
and James II. These kings were all ultra in their notions 
and despotic in their dispositions, and not recollecting the 
liberal sentiments of the age in Avhich they lived, attempted 
the exercise of powers and prerogatives which had belonged 
to monarchs of a darker and more barbarous era, and were 
inconsistent with the rights which the people by slow degrees 
had acquired. Thus, these sovereigns and their subjects 
were exactly opposite to each other in principle ; the former 
M^orked hard to restore the follies and the slavish institu- 
tions of barbarous times, while the latter were struggling 
to maintain the then more happy condition of things, and 
to add improvements suggested by increasing knowledge. 
All those who wield power and have patronage to bestow, 
will have friends, flatterers, and defenders ; and thus it 
was with the Stuarts, around whom rallied almost all the 
office-holders, office-seekers, and government-pensioners, a 
great number, and among whom were many of character 
and abilities. The liberals, trusting only to the strength 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 5 

of their principles, and having no spJendid offers of worldly- 
promotion to make to their followers, were for a while but 
a forlorn hope, much ridiculed and laughed at by the well- 
fed and richly clad minions of power. They were mocked, 
derided and despised, abused and insulted, charged with 
every species of crime and folly, and Called by ugly and 
ridiculous names. One of these nicknames came into very 
general use, and has descended down to our own times. 
This was the Avord Whig, which, as most of the old writers 
agree, v.^as applied in derision to denote the poverty of the 
liberals, who, as it was said, fed mostly on ivhcy or sour milk. 
It was an appellation just and happy in many respects, for in 
itself it contains a history and teaches an important lesson. 
It implies that the man who owns it is a defender of principle 
for the sake of principle, and, therefore, one of a sober appetite 
and frugal diet ; and it implies that he who applies it in 
derision to his neighbour, is one who hngers greedily over 
the flesh-pots, and who expects his devotion to be well-re- 
warded by the good things of the world. It was the scoffing 
invention of the gay, ghttering, and luxurious pets of royalty, 
who had grown fat on the bounties of the government, and 
wdio, by its use, proclaimed their contempt for the pure patriot 
and rigid moralist, whose ends were the glory of God and 
the good of his country. It imported that the inventor fought 
under the banner of Mammon and of power, and that his 
whey-fed antagonist, the brave and self-denying fJliig, stood 
for principle, and looked to his conscience and the applause 
of virtuous men for his reward. 

" This epithet was extremel_y appropriate in another respect; 
for- the letters which compose it are the initials of the sen- 
tence, 'We hope in God;' a motto which was printed on 
the hearts, if not on the l;>anners, of those stern-visaged men 
whom no temptations could seduce, and no dangers and trials 
bend from their just and honourable purpose. 

*' And here, my children, I wish to impress on 3'our minds 
a remark, the truth of which no honest man of my years, ob- 
servation, and reading, can deny or doubt. God rules in the 
afiairs of this world, and the course of the wicked, sooner or 
later, will lead to destruction. For a while you ma}" see the 
good beaten down and trampled on, and the evil-minded 
shooting deep and wide the roots of his power, and over- 
shadowing the world with his greatness and grandeur, till 
even the wise and learned begin to doubt, and the scoffing 
infidel lifts his:h and bold his head. A good time will surely 

V 



6 OPIXIONB OF 

come, when the strongholds of the oppressor will topple over 
his head, and the nets which he has spread abroad be swept 
away hke the hght webs of the spider in the blast of a whirl- 
wind, and then, for a while, all men will see the hand and 
hear the voice of Deity. The hand and voice will be forgot- 
ten soon; but never do you forget, my children, that he who 
aims at a just end, and, free from fanatic fury and intolerant 
■bigotry, wisely and soberly hopes in God, has laid his foun- 
dations upon a rock ; and though he progresses slowly, and 
his descendants, from generation to generation, may make 
little progress, yet the house will at last be builded, and will 
stand when the fragile tenements about it are washed away. 
I repeat it, he who hopes in God when his aims are good, 
will, in one Avay or another, surely triumph, and thus the 
Whigs of England succeeded at last, and for nearly two 
centuries millions of men have been enjoying the blessed 
fruits of their labours. This is not all ; the revolution which 
they achieved became the parent of other revolutions ; and 
the principles which they established will, from their very 
nature, go on fructifying with new im.provements until it will 
be hardly possible to recount all the blessings that have 
flowed from the labours and trials of a poor set of men who 
were despised in their day and generation, and whose toils 
were not sweetened by the hope of power, glory, or riches. 

This same term of whig was afterwards applied to that 
party in this country who resisted the oppressions and exac- 
tions of the British government ; a party which, hke its pre- 
decessor, fought against power and its corruptions, which 
honestly, and with great self-denial, contended for principle, 
and which had, for its chief dependence, an enlightened hope 
in God. 

Such, as far as I know, is a brief outhne of the origin and 
history of the word Whig, and I will now demonstrate to you 
that it still belongs to the proper party. 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

" My Nephews : My old friend Jonathan is right in regard 
to the origin and definition of the word whig ; and I invoke 
your serious attention to this part of his discourses. When 
your Uncle Sam was in his youth, he w^as often surrounded by 
such Whigs as are spoken of in the text ; and truly he recollects 
that refreshing period with lively emotions of pleasure. How 




^n ©lb toljig. 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 9 

these men now look it is hard for me to say, for they have 
been, for many years, banished from my presence, and in 
the mean time my associations have been with a race who 
have played me some of the vilest tricks. I have been their 
prisoner, and under their power; and, just heavens! how 
have I groaned in spirit at the impositions practised on me. 
But not to wander farther from my subject, I say I recollect, 
with deep reverence, the honest old republican Whigs of 
times gone by; and though every eifort has been made to 
cause me to forget what m.anner of men they were, I have 
worn their portraits in my 'heart of hearts,' and you shall 
now see how they looked. 

" There is an old Whig for you. (See p. 8.) 
"You see there are no rags here to deceive the multitude ; 
no ruffles either, and concealed silk stockings, such as I am 
told certain renowned locofoco leaders are in the habit of 
wearing. There he is, neatly trimmed off by the industry 
of his wife, and looking the mortal enemy of hypocrisy, 
treachery, and tyranny. Honest and true, brave and gene- 
rous, he looks as if he were not made to tell honeyed lies 
from the stump, or to be fattened in an official stall. Those 
big hands of his handle the axe and the spade, and the big 
heart that beats in his manly breast will never learn the 
tricks by which men are limed and caught in nets like birds 
and tishes. 

"That man will never be priest-ridden nor spoils-bought ; 
he will never wear the yoke of a humbug or a King 
Charley. 



CHAPTER III. 

SOME CURIOUS STATISTICS. 



"Most of you know," continued the aged Fancuil, " that 
after President Jackson began to conduct himself in an arbi- 
trary manner, many of the honest and enlightened men who 
had voted for him turned against him. Now the old hero 
was a stubborn and self-willed man, and opposition to his 
measures hurt him amazingly, and roused the soldier within 
him. ' I must be obeyed,' said he ; but the opposition grew 
stronger and fiercer, until the evil counsellors who were about 
the general advised him to stifle resistance, and enforce sub- 



10 OPINIONS OF 

mission to his wiJl by the means at his disposal. It was 
therefore soon made known that the whole of the immense 
patronage of the President was to be bestowed on the Presi- 
dent's friends ; and you may form some estimate of the ex- 
tent and force of this bribe by the following calculation: 
The public expenses during General Jackson's administra- 
tion averaged a little over eighteen millions of dollars per 
year, and at least one half of this sum must have gone to the 
appointees of the President. 

" The late United States bank had a capital stock of thirty- 
five millions of dollars ; and alloAving its clear profits to have 
amounted to the enormous sum of eighteen per cent.^ the 
whole income of the institution would have been only six 
millions three hundred thousand dollars per annmn. 

" It could not possibly have afforded to sj^end more than 
two-thirds of its profits for corrupt purposes ; and thus its 
energies, for good or for evil, were to those of the President 
as four is to nine. That is, its pecuniary abilities bore this 
ratio to those of the President, bat in other respects it could 
not compete with him at all. In addition to the immense 
sum of money which the executive could apply to enhance 
his power and consequence, he was also the fountain of honour, 
and had the bestowal of many offices so splendid for the dis- 
tinction alone which they confer, as to excite the emulation 
of the most aspiring spirits. 

" If, then, the Bank w^as a monster of almost resistless 
power while it existed, what was an arbitrary President clothed 
with energies at least twice as great as those of the bank ? 
If the bank, by a corrupt use of its means, could have over- 
turned the liberties of .the country, what could be done by a 
corrupt President, who was able easily to vanquish this 
mighty moneyed-monster ? If the bank, by its arms, nume- 
rous as those of the fabled giant of old called Briarieus, could 
strike down its enemies in every part of the country, who 
could stand opposed to that chief before whom the bank itself 
fell to rise no more ? Well, as I have said, President Jack- 
son used all his tremendous energies to enforce obedience to 
his will, and to crush his opponents. The millions on millions 
of public money, and all the great offices, were bestowed ex- 
clusively on his adherents ; to them only was the road to 
honour open, while his opponents w^ere the objects of official 
hatred and denunciation, marks for the foul defamation of an 
unprincipled and licentious corps of hired scribblers, pursued, 
even, by persecutions into the walks of private life, and in- 



OLD JOXATIIAX FANFATIL. 11 

jured in their private occupations. A government that dis- 
burses from eighteen to thirty milhons of dollars annuaUy, 
and has the appointment of upwards of fortjr thousand office- 
holders, can reach nearly every individual in the land, if it 
desires to do so ; and in the days of General Jackson such a 
disposition was not wanting, I assure you. He governed, or 
rather reigned, eight years, and under his administration over 
one hundred and forty millions of dollars of public money 
were expended. Mr. Van Buren, the successor to General 
Jackson, adhered rigidly to the maxims and principles of his 
predecessor, and during the four years of his power, at least 
one hundred and twelve millions of money were spent, most 
of it going to his partisans and friends. 

" The next President was that famous traitor, John Tyler, 
under whose administration one hundred mihions went chiefly 
for the benefit of those who had so long been fed out of the 
public treasury. Next comes our present chief magistrate, 
the most thoroughpaced partisan hack that ever occupied so 
high a station; a man who has uniformly shown that he con- 
sidered himself as having been placed in his present distin- 
guished position to enable him to benefit the party which 
elected him, and to ruin that portion of his fellow-citizens who 
exercised their privilege of voting against him. He was and 
is most essentially a mere party tool, and his gratitude and his 
patriotism reach not beyond the faction to which he owes his 
unmerited and accidental distinction. 

" This worthy, so eager to reward and promote the politi- 
cians who made him their instrument for the dispensation of 
the immense patronage of the government among themselves, 
made it his constant study to find out new waj's of reaching 
the treasury ; and succeeded so well, that in four years he 
found use for upwards of one hundred and eighty milhons 
of dollars ! Even this sum Vv'ould not satisfy the craving 
wants of the politicians : it was a time of jubilee with them ; 
they had a President ready to squander the continent on his 
friends, -and stars and ribbons, principahties and regal honours, 
were scattered with a profuse and wasteful hand. The arm.y 
was to be vastly increased to gratify clamorous partisans with 
captaincies and colonelcies ; brigadier and major-generals, as 
thick as blackbirds, were parading over the country in all the 
glitter and consequence of military pomp, and unknown 
and foreign countries parceled out by degrees of latitude. 
Yet this harvest of gold and of honours was reaped by the 
members of one parly only, and there were those who, 



12 OPINIONS OF 

though eminent for talents, illustrious for past services, and 
venerable with age, were not even pernriitted to glean the 
fields. And who were these ? They were the members of 
that party who for twenty years have been treated as aliens 
and step-sons by the powers that have been, excluded from 
every honourable post, and never sharing in the public money 
collected from the pockets of all. 

"For twenty years have they been excluded from all the 
offices under the general government, and during that time 
they have helped to pay upwards of five hundred millions of 
dollars, and never shared in its distribution ! What has been 
their conduct during this tim.e ? Is it net natural to suppose 
that like bondm.en for life they would become callous and 
spiritless, taking no thought for the morrow, and caring little 
what might be the result of those affairs which were admin- 
istered without any reference to their interests ? 

" They have, from the beginning, stood upon a high plat- 
form of principle, and Avithout hope of honour or emolument 
for themselves, have fought long and manfully for what they 
deemed the right. So far from having been seduced by the 
alluring bribes held out by doctrines and practices long in 
vogue, or awed by the proscriptive maxims of those in power, 
or discouraged by defeat, the little band has grown to a mighty 
party, and its veterans of a hundred battles are still as erect, 
and bold, and sanguine as when the fight began. Disappoint- 
ments, and trials, and sacrifices have not cooled their ardour 
or their courage ; threats and promises have been exhausted 
in vain ; in vain have pohticians raved, courtiers reviled, and 
a mercenary press pursued them with its thousand slanderous 
tongues. Many of them have grown gray, and poor, and 
odious in the cause, all the myrmidons of a rich and mighty 
government have been arrayed against them, and that terrible 
weapon of tyrants, the cry of treason, been rung in their ears ; 
still true to their principles and to what they conceive to be 
the cause of truth, of hberty, and of lavv^, they have struggled 
on, and are wilhng to struggle on, fighting, not for power 
and place, but content in being able to impede the giant strides 
of those in power towards despotic swa.y. Was not this the 
position of the Whigs in England and in our own glorious 
revolution ? It was, and the party that now occupies it is the 
true Whig party of this country, and of this I will satisfy 
you by some grave additional reasons. I am, my children, 
as you all know, a Tfliig ; I have been one for years; I 
glory in being one now ; 1 shall die one, and I wish the word 



OLD JONATHAN FANEFTL. 13 

engraved upon m^' tomb. I wish 3^011 also, one and all, to live 
and die in the faith, and that you may be able to do so, some- 
thing more than my wish and my example is necessary. You 
must be convinced that the Whig cause is the cause of the 
country, of humanity, of true and well-regulated liberty ; in 
a word, the cause of God. I speak after much thought, ex- 
perience, and reading, and I flatter myself that I will give 
you reasons wdiich it is impossible to answer. And remem- 
ber, I talk now not as a partisan ; it is a father who speaks, 
an aged father, whose dying wish it is that his descendants, 
to the remotest posterity, may be the free and virtuous citi- 
zens of a just and liberal government." 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

Well do I remember the days of Old Hickory. The Gene- 
ral came in to reform abuses ; and on the principle, I suppose, 
that you have to fight the devil with fire, he becamic himself 
an intolerable abuse, or rather, nuisance. He took up a notion 
that the United States Bank Avas- corrupt, and to be a match 
for it, he, or his kitchen cabinet, pitched into it with corrup- 
tions still greater. It was thought to be a controversy between 
your Uncle Sam and the Bank, but your Uncle at first had 
about as httle interest in the matter as he had in thet unex- 
plored lands of the planet Jupiter ; but he had some interest 
in the matter before it was all over, and then it was that 
he felt as if he could groan out O's as big as the Rocky 
Mountains, or the rings round Saturn. It would have been a 
relief to him to have given birth to an earthquake or two ; but 
Amos and others kept the strictest sort of a watch upon him. 
Just think of it ! The Bank spending a million or two for 
corrupt purposes, and Jackson spending as many tens of mil- 
lions ; the Bank buying a dozen or two of editors and a few 
members of Congress, and Jackson buying as many hundreds ! 
Both sides were corrupt ; but the energies of one side were 
infinitely greater than those- of the other. Two Great Beasts 
were contending, and executive Power and Patronage, the 
Monster with two heads, triumphed, and the people rejoiced. 
What did they gain? How much do the Presidents now 
spend in affecting public opinion ? How many now, in and 
out of Cono-ress, belcHQ-, Vdy and soul, to this patronage-dis- 
pensing power? How many onv-'ard strides has it taken in 
the couvfio marked v.\\\ h\ ( Jouf-ra! .iacks;ai '. Poet: it nut now 



14 OPINIONS or 

overshadow its two quondam rivals, Congress and the Judi- 
ciary ? Ay, has it not even swallovv-ed np the State sovereig^n- 
ties, and taken away individual free-will, by declaring that 
opposition to the President's wishes is "moral treason?" 

Do not you, my nephews, now begin to groan ? I should 
think a public debt of several hundred mihions would make 
you sigh at last; and if, when General Cass with his "whole 
or none," gets astride of you, you do not bellow, it will not 
be for the want of woes or of wind. ^ 



CHAPTER JV. 

ORIGIN AND MEANING OF THE WORD DEIVIOCRAT. 

' " Having given you the history and definition of the word 
TFhig,'' continued the old man to his children and grandchil- 
dren', " I propose to say something in regard to the name of 
the opposite party. I'here are few of you so young and sim- 
ple as not to know that there are certain tests by which a 
man's sincerity, in regard to'any opinion which he professes, 
may be easily ascertained, and that these tests, or rules, are 
gcnerall)^ infallible, and of universal application. If a man 
were to make a boast of his religion, and be always proclaim- 
ing himself the most pious person living, would not the world 
be apt to rank him with those Pharisees whom our Saviour 
denounced as hypocrites ? Is not the braggadocio generally 
set down as a coward ? Does the truly v/ise man make it his 
business to be always in the m.arket-place, crying up his own 
learning and acuteness ? Would any of you confide much 
in the man who was in the daily habit of declaring to you 
that he was your best and only friend ? 

" The m.an who is truly emiinent for an}^ virtue leaves it 
for others to give him a name expressive of his peculiar rank 
or v/orth, and all mankind would laugh at the braggart who 
assumed to himself the title of The Hero, the Philanthropist, 
or the Scholar. 

" The man of genuine excellence makes it knovrn by his 
deeds, and not by his words, and to this rule the exceptions 
will be found to be exceedingly few. It apphes most parti- 
cularly to politicians and statesmen, who, according to the ex- 
perience of all men and the testimony of all history, are to be 
dreaded only Avhen they assume popular names and titles. 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 15 

" We are informed that the hberties and prosperity of an- 
cient Greece suffered must from these who professed most love 
for the pubhc, and this was so generally, so universally true, 
that it made odious, through all time, a word whose primary 
meaning has nothing in it to excite disgust. The term dema- 
gogue is a compound Greek word, and literally signifies a 
leader or a friend of the people; but these demagogues, or 
leaders, or friends proved themselves so insincere and mis- 
chievous, that the appellation b}'' which they were distin- 
guished has become for ever infamous, and marks the person 
to whom it is now applied as a hypocritical, heartless, aspir- 
ing wretch, who aims at the most unwctlhy ends by the most 
despicable means. The fate of this word, and the entire and 
memorable change of its meaning, is an everlasting warning 
to all mankind of v/hat m.ay be expected from those who court 
the favour of the masses by open and immodest professions 
of love and regard ; indeed, it will generally be the case, that 
the m^n who style themselves the people's men, will, in his- 
tory, receive the title of demagogues. 

" The next historical example to which I will call your atten- 
tion is that of Rom.e. The government of this country v^-as 
once a republic, and I advise you all to keep its history con- 
stantly fresh in your memories, for it teaches many, very 
many useful lessons. Under its free institutions, the people 
became not only' great in wealth, in arts, science, and general 
prosperity, but in wisdom and patriotism, and the elevation 
to which human nature attained is attested b)^ examples of 
self-immolation and of public virtue, so sublime, that in these 
degenerate days we can hardly realize their truth. But the 
nation was a w^arlike nation ; it went on conquering and an- 
nexing foreign dominions, until the Roman people became a 
motley race, and until the Rom.an territories became so exten- 
^sive that it was impossible to govern them with that benefi- 
cent w^isdom and miOderation which had characterized the 
purer days of the republic. Revolts, plots, seditions and 
treasons were constantly occurring ; the new people infused 
their licentious spirit into the Roman masses, and propagated 
their manners and customs, and public morals rapidly-<leca3'ed. 
The ancient spirit of the people and their peculiar national 
characteristics were lost; the simple, brave and stern republi- 
cans were amalg-araated with luxurious, idle, slavish and dis- 
solute races from ail quarters of the earth ; dissipation, vice 
and extravagance increased ; there was a jargon of tongues, 
a medley of manners and opinions, a mixture of all rehgions; 



16 or.iNioN.s or 

an unnatural and inlmniionious union of dissimilar castes, sepfs 
and races. Besides all this, the distant provinces, held in 
subjection only by the constant presence of large armies, be- 
came the nurseries of military chieftains ; and these chiefs, 
growing rich on their plundered principalities, and strong in 
the affections of their soldiers, often put the laws at defiance, 
and were too strong for the feeble and distracted government 
at home. Thus things went on from worse to worse ; all the 
elections were carried by bribery, anarchy supervened, and 
then one mihtary Dictator after another held the reins of 
power, each new usurper dying the streets purpJe with the 
blood of his enemies. Now, mark you, each one of these 
tyrants courted the influence of the people, professed the most 
liberal opinions and belonged to the democratic party. During 
all this time of terror and bloodshed, there was a small party 
who were for holding on to the ancient state of things, who 
were conservative and anti-monarchical in their principles, 
who were hated by the soldiers and persecuted by each usurp- 
ing despot. This was the senate's party ; this was the party 
who clung fondly to the wreck of their once glorious and still 
beloved republic, and who for their stern adhesion to law and 
order, were hated and reviled as aristocrats, mocked and in- 
sulted, mobbed and murdered. 

"To this party belonged Cicero, who was slain by one of 
those people in defence of whose rights his tongue and his 
pen had been so elocjuent as to gain for him an immortal 
name ; to this party belonged the stern and virtuous Cato, 
and the noble and glorious Brutus, each one of whom fell 
upon his own sword that he might not survive the liberties of 
his country. IJinstrious names are these ; mighty souls were 
they who owned them, and their very mention stirs the heart 
like a burst of eloquence. Yet they were odious in their day 
and generation ; they were persecuted by those whose rights 
they held dearer them their lives, and their mortal enemy was 
C^SAR, the head of the dc/nocratic party. Some of you 
smJle as if you doubted what I said; turn if you please to any 
history of the times of wdiich I speak, and you w^ill find that 
Marius, Antony, Cassar, or Julius Ccesar, and Augustus, all 
belonged to the democratic party, were all promoted on ac- 
count of their liberal professions of love for the people, and 
their denunciations of the Senate or Conservative party. 

"I will pass over the great revolution in France in 1798, as 
I wish to speak of that in another connection, and now" remind 
you of the example of Cromwell. When those liberals in 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 17 

England, of whom I Lave spoken, had modified the tyranny 
of Charles the First, and brought that monarch to the block, 
they themselves became objects of popular hatred. Some 
aspirmg men put themselves at the head of a party exclusively 
democratic in its pretensions, and this faction soon gained the 
ascendency. Its leaders preached up with great unction the 
most unbounded hberty; they were eagerly listened to and 
warmly seconded in their zeal, and the result was the com- 
plete overthrow of the moderate repubb'cans, W bat did they 
then do? Their most beloved advocate and mighty captain, 
that pretended arch-democrat, the ranting CrontioeH, after 
supplanting all other leaders became a military Dictator, a 
tyrant, an absolute autocrat. All thes^ things are plainly 
put down in the books and known to every reader ; and now 
I will read to you a short lesson from the Book of books, that 
Sacred Register which I touch with the most reverent feel- 
ings. I always detested the habit of quoting scripture in 
political disputes, and such a habit is a desecration of the 
divine charter of our faith. It is a father, however, ^vho now 
speaks ; he is by his own nre-side, in the midst of his family, 
and his-object now is to teach useful lessons. Besides, what 
I am now going to refer to I shall quote as an historical narra- 
tive, the more impressive from the place where it is related 
and the style in which it is told. I wdll read from the XV 
chapter of the second Book of Samuel: 

"•'And it came to pass after this, that Absalom prepared him 
chariots and horses, and fifty men to run before him. 

"'And Absalom rose up early and stood beside the way of 
the gate : and it was so that when any man that had a con- 
troversy came to the king for judgment, then Absalom called 
to him/ and said, of what city art thou ? And he said thy 
servant is one of the tribes of Israel. 

"'And Absalom said unto him, see, thy matters are good 
and right ; but there is no man deputed of the king to hear 
thee. 

" ' Absalom said, moreover, oh that I were made judge in the 
land, that every man which hath an}^ suit or cause might 
come unto me, and I would do him justice ! 

"'And it was so, that w^hen any man came nigh to him to 
do him obeisance, he put forth his hand, and took him, and 
kissed him. 

" ' And it came to pass after forty years, that Absalom said 
unto the king, I pray thee let me ^o and pay my vow which 
I have vowed unto the Lord in Hebron. And the king said 



18' oriMoxs OF 

unto him, go in peace. So he arose and went to Hebron/ 
Now what was the result of all this ? Hear what the sacred 
historian says : 

*'^But Absalom sent spies throughout all the tribes of Isi'aei 
saying, as soon as ye hear the sound of the trumpet, then ye 
shall say Absalom reigneth in Hebron. 

"'And with Absalom wen^two hundred men out of Jeru- 
salem that were called : and they went in their simplicity^ 
and they knew not any thing.' 

" I'he sequel of this story, told with such graphic simplicity* 
is knoAvn to you all. It would seem that the inspired penmau 
was relating the history of a modern democratic leader, for 
the manner in which Absalom won the hearts of the people, 
is still in vogue and practised every day before our own eyes. 
Some of the people, 'in their simplicity,' did not suspect the 
designs of Absalom, and through their honesty were deceived; 
and thus it is in our own day, though, when the historian shalx 
undertake to chronicle the events of our times, whenever he 
says, 'such a one professed great love for the people,' the 
reader will at once be prepared for the account of a demagogue. 
Why is it that the contemporaries^ do not see the designs of 
these demagogues, as clearly as we can see them in history 
as soon as their names are mentioned? 

- "Several reasons may be assigned. We are all susceptible 
of flattery, and we dislike too to suspect of evil intentions a 
fellow'citizen, Avhom we know and with whom we have e^:- 
changed friendly courtesies. 

" Still you may rest assured of this fact: your neighbor who 
professes ultra-democratic principles, is no n)ore to be credited 
than the historical character whom you distrust the moment 
he is alluded to as one Avho courted the people. 

"It is perhaps needless for me to say to you that when I 
warn you, by these solemn lessons from history, to be^vare of 
those who affect popular names, that I myself am not a friend 
to the cause of the people. God forbid that I should ever be 
aught than a republican, or that I, even for the last week of 
my life, should have to hve under any other form of govern- 
ment. If I know myself, the most ardent wish of my soul 
is, that all my fellow-men may enjoy the blessings of freedom, 
and that they may all, if possible, become equal, and virtuous 
and happy. If Iliad my way, there should not be a slave or 
• ' beggar on this fair earth of ours ; but mark you, slavery and 
, -ggaiy are but too apt to follow the success of those selfish 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 19 

and aspiring men who make an immodest boast of their love 
for the people. 

" I wish also to remind you that I do not mean to say that 
the democratic leaders in this country are all Csesars and 
Cromwells. Of course I would be accused of this by the 
heated partisan, for it is a rule with such not to try to discover 
the meaning of an opponent, but to put upon his words the 
worst possible construction which they will bear. I am not 
now on the hot arena of political strife ; I am calml}^ and dis- 
passionately talking at my fire-side, and you are listening to 
learn, not to entrap. I trust in Heaven that the chiefs of the 
democratic party may be honest and sincere. I devoutly hope 
they are, but the name which they have assumed awakens 
suspicions. Of course, the democratic people are honest and 
sincere, for they have no interest in being otherwise. They 
are seeking their own good, the good of the masses, but are 
ihvj not deceived in regard to what is true democracy ? If 
they were looking for the most pious man, would they select 
the greatest boaster? 

" Alas ! when we are flattered we are blinded, and like the 
poor confiding female, we believe the love we bear our flatterer 
to be nmtual, and do not wake from our delusion until our 
ruin is irreparable. Thank God," said the old man rising, 
*'I never yet was deceived by honeyed phrases, and I conjure 
you, my children, 7iever to put your faith in one who styles 
himself a great Christian or a great democrat. There is 
always an evil design cloaked under such professions.''^ 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

Could I keep from groaning when 1 read this chapter ? 
How many Absaloms have we now-a-days, who " put forth 
the hand," and take the people and "kiss" them? And 
then how do these Absaloms lament that they are not made 
"judges in Israel," that every man "that hath any suit or 
cause" might come to them? And what are they after ? 
what would they do ? By and by you will hear the sound 
of the trumpet and a voice saying, "Absalom reignethT'' 
When begging you for office, my nephews, they clothe them - 
selves in' sackcloth and ashes ; when they get office they 
feel as much for your welfare as they feel for the dead ani- 
mals whose flesh furnishes forth their meals. When minaflinjr 
with you, they shoM how they estimate your sense of decency 



20 OPINIONS OF 

by Avearing torn breeches ; when they get in power they have 
their breeches mended and charge you v/ith the cost. Oh that 
you could come into their secret places and know these Absa- 
loms as I know them ! 



CHAPTER V. 

THE ISSUES. 

As the venerable speaker finished saying wlmt is recorded 
in the last chapter, he fell into a revery and remained for 
some time silent. His mind seemed to have got upon an un- 
pleasant train of thought, and he continued musing until he 
was roused from his contemplations by a sprightly boy who 
asked him the following question : 

- "Grandfather, what are Whigs now for, and what are the 
Democrats for?" 

" Truly, child," answered the old man, " I wish every one 
of my fellow citizens would ask himself that question, and 
then soberly and conscientiously endeavour to answer it by 
all the lights before him. There is, indeed, betw^een the two 
parties the broadest difference, not only as to measures of ad- 
ministrative policy, but in the vital principles by which they 
are animated and held together. The measures on which 
they first differed, were chiefly these : 

" 1. The Sub-treasur}''. 

' 2. The Tariff: 

" 3. The disposition of the fund arising from the sales of 
the public lands. 

It is a matter of history that the first of these measures was 
first passed during the presidency of Mr. Van Buren, and that 
it was the chief measure of his administration, and the one on 
which he put himself before the country at the next election. 
It is also an historical fact that at that election, he and his 
darling scheme were condem.ned by an overwhelming ver- 
dict; by the largest popular majority ever given in this coun- 
Ir}'". This, it was supposed, would have given the project 
its eternal quietus, for it had been fairly put to the jury of the 
country ; but it found in Mr. Polk a resurrectionist, and is 
now, with some modifications, the law of the land. The ob- 
jections to it are : 



OLD JONATIIAX FANEUIL. 21 

"1. It puts under the control of the President and his 
agents all the pubHc funds. 

"2. It places the pubhc funds in the keeping of unsafe 
hands. 

" 3. The object was to destroy credit, curtail the circulating 
medium, increase discounts on exchanges, and make, in a 
word, the rich richer and the poor poorer. 

" 4. It is a bungling system, designed only as a substitute 
for better Whig measures, and is not carried out even by its 
makers and fathers. Indeed the whole course of the democratic 
party in regard to the currency has been a series of contra- 
dictions and absurdities, the like of which was never exhi- 
bited before, and never will be again by any civilized go- 
vernment. They have made it the subject of one experiment 
after another, and tinkered on it until I doubt whether the Se- 
cretary of the Treasury himself understands what is the finan- 
cial pohcy of the day. Now the currency is the very hfe-blood 
of the nation, and the very last thing on earth on which quacks 
should be allowed to try their nostrums. It is a matter of 
momentous importance, and the shghtest irregularity in it, 
or injury to it, at once and vitally affects the heakh of the 
whole body politic. Hence the unwise tinkering of the powers 
that have been, have produced crash after crash — convulsion 
after convulsion, and nothing but the inherent energy and vast 
resources of the nation have preserved it from utter ruin, it 
is yet full of the vigour and hope of youth ; but notwithstand- 
ing this, it shows plainly the marks of the successive pecu- 
niary scourges with which it has been afflicted. Twenty 
years ago, I had a young neis^hbour who was just setting up 
for himself in the world. He was without money or estate, 
but he had a good character for industry, intelligence and 
honesty, and this character v/as Avorth as much to him as five 
thousand dollars of ready money. He, hke all of his con- 
temporaries, easily got credit for what he wanted to start him 
in business, and in a very short time he was getting rich. 
Those were the golden days of the republic, and then it was 
truly the case that character was wealth. How is it now ? 
I know the history of the ups and downs of many young men 
of fine acquirements and excellent habits, and it makes my 
heart bleed as I think how they have been tossed about by 
fortune's blanket. The labours of Hercules were hght com- 
pared with thos3 which it now requires to make the first 
dollar clear, and the time is fast coming, if it has not already 



22 OPINIONS OF 

arrived, when the door to wealth ivlll be closed to those who 
are born poor. 

" Why is it thatbeg-gary and vice have increased so rapidly 
in the last few years ? We have still been Hving under a de- 
mocratic reign. 

" Why is it that notwithstanding the growing power and 
greatness of our country, the wages of labour are daily be- 
coming smaller, the condition of the poor getting worse, and 
the importance and privileges of the pich increasing ? All this 
has happened under democratic rule. 

" Why is it that poor young men of talents and character 
find their situation getting worse every j^ear, and their hopes 
of success and influence in the world growing darker and 
darker ? Twelve or fifteen years ago the relative number of 
young men who emerged, by means of their own industry, 
from poverty and obscurity, was to that of a similar class in 
the present day as five is to three, and still the resources of the 
country have been in the course of development and the ge- 
neral prosperity ought to have been increasing. 

"Twelve or fifteen 5^ears ago the proportion of the commu- 
nity who lived by theft, or who w^ere tenants of the aims- 
house and the poor-house, was much smaller than it now is ; 
and yet the means of honest livehhood ought to have been 
vastly increased. Ten or fifteen years ago the proportion of 
poor young females who were driven to prostitution to gain a 
living, was infinitely smaller than it now is ; and all this 
while the benign principles of Democracy have been in 
operation. 

"• The pecuniary crises and convulsions which have oc- 
curred under Democratic sway, would, successively, soon 
pass ofT and be forgotten, but each one, though it did not 
destroy the general system, has crijjpled seme limb of the 
body-politic ; has left an inefTaceable mark, an incurable sore. 

" Public and private morals have depreciated tiuenty per 
cent, at least in so m.any years ; public and private honesty 
has depreciated in the same or a greater ratio : beggary, and 
crime and wretchedness, have advanced apace, and wealth 
has been flowing from the many and accumulating in the 
hands of the few. 

" But, it is said, such things will happen as a country grows 
older. Why should they? Human nature, we know, depre- 
ciates under arbitrary and corrupt systems of government, 
but should not men, under the pure sway of Democracy, 
grow wiser, or better and more happy ? Is it not the tendency 



OLD JOXATIIAN FAXEUIL. 23 

of freedcm to ennoble and exalt the masses and daily to ren- 
der their condition better ? Certainly it is, and yet, under a 
government based on the purest principles of liberty, in a 
great, fruitful, and thinly peopled continent, povert}?-, crime, 
and social degradation, have fearfully increased among a 
young people who have not yet reached their prime. Who 
is to blame for all this ? For twenty years the Whigs have 
been excluded from power ; for twenty years the politicians 
of the self-styled Democratic school have governed the 
country. Could you see, painted in pictures, the condition 
of our country and the character of its people twenty ^^ears 
ago, and its present situation and the present character of its 
people, how you would stare ! And what, if things go on 
so, will be the picture twenty years hence ? 

" If the drugging of the life-blood is kept up ; if one crisis 
after another is to continue to happen, the whole body will at 
last present a loathsome and rotten mass of corruption. Think, 
ponder on these things." 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

I am here reminded of a story which I used to hear, and 
which it may be profitable here to relate. There was, in a 
certain country, a city famous, as well for the sobriety and 
wealth o£-its citizens, as for the salubrity of its climate and 
the healing quality of its waters. These latter were all con- 
ducted by pipes and conduits, from a grand reservoir or foun- 
tain on a hill, in the suburbs of the city ; and so delightful, 
refreshing, and healthful were they, that no epidemic or fatal 
disease could ever prevail for any time in the city, and in 
fact, sickness of any sort was of very rare occurrence. It 
was, in those days, exceedingly pleasant to visit that town, for 
its male inhabitants were all hale, stout, and likely, and its 
females the fiii-est and most beautiful in the world. In pro- 
cess of time there arose a physician, who, for lack of skill in 
his profession, or for want of patients in a region so healthy, 
came near to starve, and therefore beg-an to revolve in his 
mind a scheme for the bettering of his fortune. He began 
to declaim against the use of the waters of the healthy foun- 
tain, contending that they were unhealthy and poisonous, pro- 
ducing various kinds of maladies and bringing many to 
premature graves. The people stared at these assertions, 
some of them looking on the doctor as stark mad, for it was 
well known that the citizens of the town lived longer and 



24 OPINIONS OF 

were more healthy than any other people ; and as for the 
maladies alluded to, they had never seen nor heard of one 
of them. 

The doctor, nothing daunted, contended that the fact that 
his fellow citizens were more healthy than other people, was 
no argument in favour of the fountain, but rather against it ; 
for that the health and vigor and long hves of the people demon- 
strated the greatness of their constitutions and the glory of 
their chm.ate, and led him to infer, that, but for the water 
which they drank, they would live for ever. And as to the 
cases which were so loudly called for, he, by some means, 
and from some obscure or unknown place, produced various 
patients afiiicted with loathsome and terrible complaints, and 
who, one and all, declared that they had been perfectly healthy 
until they began to drink of the waters of the Healthy Fountain. 
At this the people of the town opened their eyes still wider, 
and not a few of them began to beheve in the doctor, when 
they saw him heal his patients with certain medicated patent 
waters which he kept in bottles. At last the party of the 
physician triumphed ; it was solemnly agreed in the councils 
of the cit}^ that the old fountain should be destroyed ; and 
accordingly on a day appointed, the city authorities and a 
great concourse of people attended upon the hill which was 
called Fountain Hill, and with axes, hoes, hammers, mattocks 
and other weapons, destroyed the reservoir or great basin, 
from which they had been so long supphed with water. 

At this the doctor harangued the multitude on their deliver- 
ance from a thousand pestilences which he eloquently de- 
scribed, and many of the populace embraced him, shouted, and 
manifested the most extra A^agant signs of joy. It was agreed 
that the doctor should supply the town with a certain healing 
beverage which he had prepared, and for which the whole 
city was to pay him an annual revenue, to be raised by taxes. 
All were satisfied with this arrangement, but in a very few 
days a dreadful and fatal epidemic broke out in the city, com- 
mitting the most horrid ravages, and carrying oft" daily an 
incredible number of persons. Some few there were who 
blamed the doctor for all this, and clamoured loudly for the 
restoration of the Healthy Fountain ; but the doctor's power 
and popularity were now supported by his great vv^ealth, and 
he persuaded a majority of the people that the scourge with 
which they were visited was the consequence of the unwhole- 
some waters of the fountain. " You see liow much stuff it 
had arcumnlnted in v^ir systems." said lie, " and in how manv 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. . 25 

it has planted the seeds of death ; and it is m}' solemn convic- 
tion, that had you continued its use another year longer, every 
soul of you would have perished." At this the people shouted, 
" Long live the good doctor, our great deliverer !" and as the 
sickness and death increased, felt more and more glad of their 
escape from the dreadful fountain. Even many of the dying 
beheved that they Avould have lived had the doctor's advice 
been taken earher ; and those v/ho languished with disease 
uttered the most horrid imprecations on the fountain and its 
friends. A great addition was made to the salary of the doc- 
tor ; his popularity became unbounded and irresistible, and 
as diseases of every sort increased, so increased the copious 
use of his medicated waters. About one-half of the popula- 
tion soon died, and all the other half were afflicted with vomit- 
ings, bloody fluxes, sores, biles, swellings, fevers, itches, 
coughs, chills, leprosies, and jaundices ; and in the course of 
time the population dwindled to a few thousands of pale, 
cadaverous, shriveled mummies and dwarfs, who still con- 
tinued to invoke blessings on the name of the doctor whose 
medicines had saved their lives. In the mean time that doc- 
tor held every man's conscience and freedom in his immense 
iron-chest, while his drugs held the mastery over every one's 
mind and body. 

It is your Uncle Sam's deliberate opinion the world is 
drugged too much. Lo the pet Banks and the Sub-Trea- 
sury ! 



CHAPTER VL 

THE PUBLIC-LAND FTIN'D. 



" I SCARCELY deem it worth my while to say much on the 
subject of the public lands," continued the aged citizen of 
Maryland. " The Whig pohcy, in regard to them, is fathered 
on General Jackson, who afterwards strangled his own bant- 
ling, because it met with favour from Henry Clay. The reve- 
nue arising from the sales of the public domain, and from the 
tariff; was larger than the national expenditures, and Jackson 
had in his message, dated 8th December, 1829, thus alluded 
to a surplus revenue, which he expected soon to accumulate m 

the treasury : — r • f 

" ' As then the period approaches when the apph cation ot 

the revenue to the payment of debt will cease, the disposition 

3 



26 OPINIONS OF 

of the surplus will present a subject for the serious delibera- 
tion of Congress, and it nnay be fortunate for the country that 
it is yet to be decided. It appears to me that the most safe, 
just, and federal disposition which could be made of this sur- 
plus revenue, would be its apportionment among the several 
States, according to their ratio of representation ; and should this 
measure not be^ found warranted by the constitution, that it 
would be expedient to propose to ihe States an amendment 
authorizing it.' 

" Now many of the public lands had been given, by the old 
States, to the general government for the general good, and as 
the object of their donation, the payment of the pubhc debt, 
had been accomplished, some thought the donors ought to 
have them back again. Others thought the new States ought 
to have them, and some unwisely believed the income arising 
from them ought to remain in the public treasury. It was 
dangerous there, as General Jackson fully demonstrated, for 
the government ought to have no source of revenue indepen- 
dent^of the people. Every dollar that the administration 
spends ought to be collected out of the people, and this, and 
this only will ensure rigid economy and a strict accountability. 

" Well, there were so many interests besides the pubhc good 
at stake in this matter, that the whole subject became 
extremely embarrassing, and instead of being referred to 
the proper committee was referred to that on manufactures, 
and of which Mr, Clay was chairman. Now, here was a 
nice trap laid for the bold and fearless statesman from Ken- 
tucky, and his enemies chuckled at the prospect of having 
him completely cornered. If, thought they, he is in favour 
of giving up these lands to the new States in which they 
lie, then we w-ill denounce the rank injustice of the thing, and 
in the old States raise a terrible storm about his head. If he 
recommends that they go back to the donors, the new States, 
of course, would be indignant, and thus, as it Avas thought, 
Mr. Clay was in a dilemma. So he vv^ould have been, had 
popularity been his object ; but he had nobler ends in view, 
and brought in a bill providing that the proceeds of the pub- 
hc lands be divided among all the States, according to their 
federal population. 

♦' Can any of you see any objection to such a measure ? Of 
course, however, it was opposed ; but it finally passed through 
Congress, and the President, whose language on this subject 
I have quoted to you, permitted it to perish. He could not, 
I presume, have the effrontery to veto the measure which was 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 27 

SO nearly in accordance with views he had expressed a few 
years before, but he never returned it, the session of Con- 
p-ress being- within less than ten days of its close. 

♦' From that day to this the Democratic party have opposed 
Mr. Clay's policy, simply, perhaps, because it was his policy. 
The public never were before divided on so plain a question, 
and posterity will wonder that men could have been so blinded 
and carried away by party bigotry. This fund, in the hands 
of the States, would have brought a market to every man's 
door, and have educated every child in the nation. It would 
have made the whole country to blossom like the rose ; it would 
have yielded the most glorious and lasting fruits by its judicious 
investment in canals, railroads, schools, colleges, hospitals, and 
asylums. 

" The mind is astounded at the contemplation of the vast 
benefits of a permanent character that would have flowed 
from the proper management of this great land fund ; and the 
ill success of a scheme so obviously wise, so purely good in 
all its tendencies, and so entirely free from every species of 
serious objection, teaches a most impressive lesson. It demon- 
strates the feebleness of the human understanding v,-hen com- 
pared with the power of passion and prejudice, and will re- 
main a lasting and m.elancholy example of the svcay of pohticai 
quacks, and of the stupendous follies comm.itted under their evil 
guidance by even enlightened and honest men. And where 
now is that 'fund ? Whom has it benefited ? Where is thera 
one monument of its useful apphcation ? That immense surplus 
revenue has been squandered on the pets of unthrifty admin- 
istrations ; and that fair and boundless domain has, like the 
broad acres of a prodigal son, melted away, its former owner 
showing in his wild and reckless habits, his feverish pulse and 
his bloated aspect, his corrupted appetites and his rapidly de- 
cavino- constitution, the only memorials of his once mighty 
possessions. 

"May I not conclude that we here see the chief difTerence 
between the politicians of the two parties ? Their positions 
in regard to this land-fund marks their character with suf- 
ficient distinctness ; but you shall have still further evidence 
to satisfy you that the leaders on one side would win their 
way by*^ pandering to a corrupt appetite, while those on the 
other are falsely charged Avith being tyrants, because, if they 
had the guardianship of the government, they would keep a 
strict watch over the wild inclinations of their ward. The 
minor, full of life, and strength, and passion, may now despise 



2& OPINIONS OF 

the counsel of its austere friends ; but a time will come when 
its palsied limbs, its prematurely Avasted energies, and its 
broken constitution, Vv-ill attest the folly of its choice." 



UxXCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

It always seemed to me that the democratic politicians 
looked on the public lands as a largesse belonging to them, 
and out of which, as Ccesar did in his will, they could grant 
farms to the people, and thus bid against each other for the 
Presidency. The world thinks me rich Avith all these broad 
jfccres in possession, Avhile, in fact, they are of about as much 
service to me as would be a plantation at the bottom of the 
ocean ; and if many additions arc made to them from the 
lands in Mexico, I shall certainly burst up, and no mistake. 
The whole democratic policy with regard tS them has been 
based, not on principles of justice, but on the majority prin- 
ciple : — that is to say, they are always looking to the buying 
o{' voles ; and that plan which seems likely to secure most 
Totes is the plnn they favour. Some of these days some 
vSolon or Lycurgiis will, in order to outstrip all competition, 
■for the favour of the great West, propose to cede to the new 
States the public lands and the old States which once owned 
thesp lands. This is not such a silly project after all ; and 
the time is not distant when some plodding, Polk-rate, ambi- 
tious Ass, or Cass, will propound it. Wisconsin, for instance,, 
contains ninety thousand square miles ; and when thickly 
settled, will have an electoral vole as large as some dozen 
of our other States. Now let some as})iring member of the 
House introduce a bill to tax New England for the benefit of 
New York and Pennsylvania ; to tax the Southern States for 
the benefit of Mississippi, Missouri, and Texas ; and to tax 
the West for Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Michigan ; and 
let him stick to his plan for twenty-live years, and there is no 
telling what may hapjien. It is a wonder this view of the 
subject has never occurred to " the whole of Oregon" men. 
If they were not so old they might make something out of the 
hints here thrown out. If the whole of my public domain 
was gathered into one mountain-mass of earth, and were to 
explode, and be riven to ten millions of fragments with some 
volcanic agency, it would be something like the groan I wish 
to utter when I think of locofoQo folly in its management of 
my lands ! 



OLD JOXATHAX FA>'EUIL. 29 



CHAPTER YII. 

THE TARIFF. 

"The Tariff question," said the venerable speaker in con- 
tinuation of his discourse, " has, for some years past, excited 
much discussion. In reg-ard to this matter, one party stood 
on the ground occupied by the fathers of the Republic, and 
by all the great men of the nation until a recent date. It is 
the wise policy of our government to raise its revenue by im- 
posts laid on imported goods ; and from the days of General 
Washington to those of General Jackson, these imposts were 
so regulated as to afford incidental protection to American 
man a fact u res. The thing could be done without injuring 
any one, and the policy was so wise, had proved so salutary'', 
and had been so long in operation, that I was for a Jong time 
at a loss to know how parties came to divide upon it." 
; "And how did they?'' asked one of the old gentleman's 
sons. " This very matter has puzzled me more than a httle." 

"Listen," answered the old man, "and I will tell you. 
Listen, and you shall hear a new chapter from that mysteri- 
ous book, human nature. 

" Free Trade^ you must knovv^ is a sound that falls plea- 
santly on the ears, and awakens many agreeable sensations. 
It conjures up in the mind a train of delightful ideas; it seems 
to be something antagonistic to monopolies, restrictions, op- 
pressions, and impositions ; and imports fair play and equal 
rijrhts to all. Il is to the lover of iustice a most fascinating 
term ; it fills the oppressed with happy dreams of an unfet- 
tered trade, as well as an unfettered will; and, in the imagi- 
nations of all, is associated with sublime notions of equity, 
liberty, and general prosperity. Now Free Trade, in itf; 
broadest and most abstract sense, is indeed a glorious thing ; 
but Free Trade, as used by parties in this country, is u 
purely technical tenn, and has a purely technical meaning. 
It means simply a particular kind of Tariff, and \Vould not. 
if fully carried out, lighten the burdens of a human soul, or 
add one per cent, to the general prosperity. But, as I said, 
the term is a captivating one ; and though, in its meaning, it 
be vague enough, the sound is an agreeable sound, and the 
sound was what the politit^ians wanted. The less meaning- 



3^ OriKIONS OF 

the word might have the better. W it had no meaning it 
would commit its authors to no particular poHcy, while it 
furnished them with a popular and exciting battie-cry. 

" Again : of all classes of men, the manufacturers are most 
likely to excite envy and dishke — and I will tell you why. 
Their business has to be done on a very extensive scale ; 
their emplo3aiient generall}^ requires the investment of a 
large capital ; and the sight of a factory, imposing from its 
size and fixtures, awakens notions of riches and power. The 
buildings are generally large and massive ; the hands are 
numerous. There are piles of goods, and there are a roar 
imd clatter, and din of machinery from early morn till late at 
night; filhng the mind with immense ideas of wealth, and 
energ^^ and progress. Fields and stores are silent and still ; 
but the factory, from sun to sun, is stimning your ears with 
the noise of its might, and there is in it such a whirling of ma- 
chinery, such a rattling, banging, thundering crash and hub- 
bub, and every thing moves su swiftly and furiously, that you 
cannot but associate it with ideas of rapid improvement and tre- 
mendous power. Hence it is the easiest thing in the world to 
make odious the owner of such an G>}iabl;sliinent ; and hence 
it is, too, that for every owner oi" a factory there are dozens 
of factory labourers, all of whom are apt to envy thoir em- 
plo3^er. Each of these establis-hments employs a great many 
hands — some more, some less; and these hands, generally 
entertaining mistaken notions in regard to the \vealth and 
happiness of their em])k)yers, would, naturally enouph, feel a 
secret pleasure at the prospect of smaller profits and conwe- 
querice. It follows, the.u, tliat factory owners niust necessa- 
rily be unpopular ev^en at home, and that they arc, all over 
the country, objects of envy and dislike. 

*^Well: Free Trade, it ^yas said, would curtail the enor- 
mous profits of the manufacturers, in) prove the condition of 
the fa-rmers and mechanics, and lift from the shoulders of the 
people generally the great burdens under which they were 
toiling and sweating. What these burdens were, although 
so ponderous, it required some ingenuity to discover, or even 
to prove that there were any burdens a\ all. The good pro- 
posed to be achieved was e<jually vague and uncertain ; but 
mystery, it is said, is an element of grandeur; and on this' 
principle, pei\}iap«, the objects of the free-traders were made 
to assume an innnense importance. They had a soul-stirring, 
h«art-warming motto— " Free Trade and Equal Rights;'* 
they had an unpopular sect for their target, and for argu- 



OLD JOXATUAX FANEUIL. 31 

ments, they had a whole vocabulary of charming- words. 
These words and phrases — such as "Death to monopolies," 
"Protection to all ahke," "No bounties," and "Fair compe- 
tition," were about as appropriate to the cause in which they 
were used as "Liberty of conscience" would have been as 
the motto of the Spanish Inquisitors ; but it was thouoht that 
the people would not stop to consider, or, if they did, they 
would take the word for the thing. They did consider, how- 
ever — to their eternal praise be it spoken — they did consider, 
and the great masses of them, even in the agncultural States, 
Gam«. to understand one of the most abstruse subjects that" 
could be brought before them. 

" On this issue, then, their favourite one, the Democracy 
were fairly beaten, and they knew it. 

" During the memorable campaign of 1844, there were, in 
every part of the country, unmistakable signs of an approach- 
ing triumph to the cause of the Whigs — the people with one 
loud acclaim endorsed the sentiments of the statesman of Ken- 
tucky, the great champion of the American system, and the 
blackness of darkness was gathering in thick Cimmerian 
gloom upon the hopes of deinocracy. Its leaders even began 
to despair, and not a man in the nation doubted but that an 
overwhelming majority- of the free vrters of the country would 
give their suffrages for Mr. Clay and his tariff policy. Even 
the policy was uiore popular than its glorious advocate and 
the true democrat — the man who believed that the majority 
should govern — believed that this policy was and ought to be 
the policy of the country." How did Mr. Polk and his advisers 
acquiesce in the will of the people? Did they, fairly repre- 
senting the character whose name they bore, manifest a desire 
to have a fair expression of popular opinion, and to have that 
opinion embodied in the legislation of the country? 

" He, James K. Polk, the nominee of the Democracy for the 
highest office in the country, wrote a letter to one Mr. John 
K. Kane of Philadelphia, and in that letter he took a position 
so doubtful as to induce the belief that he was in favor of a 
tariff discriminating for protection to American manufactures. 

" This letter was intended and was used for purposes of de- 
ception, and it was the text from w^hich two opposite doctrines 
were preached. Here is the evidence : in the Senate of the 
United States, on July 22, 1846, Simon Cameron, a senator 
from Pennsylvania, a staunch democrat and a man of high 
character, spake what I will read to you : 

"'You and I, Mr. President,' said 'Mr. C, 'remember the 



S2 OPINIONS ov 

scenes of '44 in our State ; the anxiety that pervaded the De- 
mocratic Party until the Kane letter made its appearance. 
That letter was seized upon by pohtical leaders, was used 
upon the stump, was translated into German, and publislied 
in all our party papers, English and German. It is not too 
much to say tliat that letter turned the scale and decided the 
presidential election. But for it you would not now be sitting 
where you are, nor w'ould Mr. Polk be occupying the presi- 
dential chair.' Mr. C. also stated that he attended upwards 
of 100 mass meetings, democratic, and that at all of tliem the 
banners were emblazoned with the words, 'Polk and Dallas, 
Texas and the Tariff of 1842.' 

" These were his words when Mr. Polk, now President, 
was urging through Congress a tariff law, exactly such as 
his northern friends had believed that he would oppose. 

*'Is it not evident that here was foul-play, rank deception? 

" Was not the Whig tariff of 1842 unfairly 'done to death,' 
and the Democratic tariff of 1846 ingeniously forced upon the 
country without the nation's consent ? 

" The remarks which I have made on this subject, and the 
proof I have adduced, will justify the following broad con- 
clusion: the will of the people in regard to the tariff was 
stifled. 

''JFas it truJij Ijeinocratlc to endeavour to elude the popular 
ivill, and to thrust upon the )iation a measure which it was 
known the nation, if left to itseJf would have condemned. 

''Were those leading men, in Pennsylvania, true Demo- 
crats, g-enuine friends of the people, who when they saw that 
the people of the State were utterly deceived in regard to a 
matter of momentous interest to them, did not and would 
not undeceive them, and even encouraged them in their 
delusion ^^ 

''Was he a Democrat at heart, and laorthy of the high 
station of Fresideiit, ?vho saw that the people were opposed 
to his policy, and who, instead of letting them have their 
way, penni'tted them to be duped, and teas himself instrU' 
mental i?i the leading of them astray? 

"If there is one descended from me, I care not how tender 
be his years, whose untutored heart does not prompt him to 
give a strong negative response to each of these three ques- 
tions, I hereby disown him for ever.- He is a cunning sophister 
— a sly calculator, in whose breast a dark ambitious spirit has 
smothered the ingenuous and truthful impulses of his better 



OLD JOXATIIAN FANEUIL. 3^ 

nature, and who, when his interest prompts, will never be at 
a loss for a reason to justify error and palliate crime. 

"No: the boundaries of right and wrong are generally 
plainly, visibly, broadly marked, and whosoever confounds 
them is without understanding, or devoid of principle. Some 
subtle cases there are in which it is hard to define the right ; 
but whoso knows not that truth is just, and falsehood wicked 
and mischievous, can never be made to understand the plain- 
est commandment in the decalogue. 

" But how, you ask, did Mr. Polk come to be elected ? I 
will answer that question as fully as I can, and I wish you 
now to give me your most serious attention, for we are verg- 
ing upon matters of the gravest hnportance." 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

General Jacksox was in favour of a judicious tariff, 
which being interpreted means any sort of a tariff that could 
get him most votes. He M-as a wise man, the old General, 
and in this particular Mr. Van Buren and Mr. Polk followed 
ill his footsteps. The next nominee wiil doubtless entertain 
similar sentiments on this subject, and the ultras at both ends 
of the Union will be assured of his hearty sympathy. The 
Democratic presidential aspirants are capital hands at dodg- 
ing, and on questions of finance and revenue give their opi- 
nions most judiciously. Under the old system of things my 
affairs prospered finely; I had my " pockets full of money," 
and my nephews got on swimmingly with those series of 
tariffs, begun under Washington, and continued till the days 
of General Jackson. But new lights have arisen, the wisdom 
of the ancionts, it is now proved, was all folly, and the country 
was grossly humbugged, until locofocoism arose to bless the 
world and rifle m}* Treasury. By their new doctrines they 
manage to keep a firm hold on my iron chest ; but all the 
wisdom of the universe could not determine what sort of a 
tariff or financial policy now prevails. It can be best explained 
by the opposite cuts : [See Plate opposite.] 

Can you blame your Uncle for groaning at the daily con- 
templation of such a sight ? I sometimes almost Avish I was 
blind, that I might not see the naked ugliness of locofocoism. 



36 OPINIONS OF 



CHAPTER VIII. 

WHAT IS DEMOCRACY ? 

" What is Democracy ?" asked the aged farmer. " If you 
were to answer this question from the dictionary you would 
say that it is that form of government in which the sovereign 
power is lodged in the people. This is democracy as con- 
tradistinguished from monarchy, or the government of one 
man, and Oligarchy or the government of a few. In this 
country, however, we are all republicans ; there are no mo- 
narchists, and he who boasts of being a Democrat either glo- 
rifies himself for being what we all are, or else, to enhance his 
influence and importance, has adopted a name which has no 
certain meaning. We will suppose, however, that the term, 
as here used, means the largest liberty ; that it refers to a 
government in which there is a universal equality of political 
rights, one in which the popular will is not to be fettered ; and 
in which, on all public matters, the popular voice must be 
fully, fairly, and freely expressed and be of binding effect. 
This would be a truly happy condition of things, but it does 
not exist in this country, and I will now proceed to tell you 
why. 

Since the days of General Jackson, it has been a universal 
rule with those in power to bestow the patronage of the go- 
vernment only on those who agree with them in political sen- 
timent. What is this but coercion, a direct attempt to stifle 
public opinion or force it into a particular channel ? It is known 
to you all that I have, by years of industry and frugality, ac- 
cumulated a considerable estate, and you, my children and 
descendants, expect to share it among you when I am no 
more. Suppose I were to set myself up as an apostle of re- 
ligious freedom ; to profess uncompromising hostihty towards 
every species of intolerance, and to declare it to you as my 
sincere and solemn wish that you should, in regard to rehgious 
matters, exercise your own free will and not permit my opi- 
nions or my example to have any undue weight in biasing 
your judgments. What would you think of me, if after all 
this, I should make a will directing that not one cent of my 
property go to those of you who did not belong to the Metho- 
dist church ? Indeed, what would you think if, at the very 
time I was declaiming in favour of liberty of Conscience, I 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 37 

should be refusing to support, educate, or even countenance 
in any way those of you who had seen fit to embrace a faith 
different from my own? Would I not entitle myself to the 
contempt and detestation of all honest and honorable men? 
and would not my words and my professions be considered 
by you as a bitter mockery? Would I not be, in fact, a 
tyrant, a bigot, a despicable hypocrite ? 

" Now the government is, in a certain sense, the guardian, 
the protector, the father of us all, and we are all entitled to 
its care, and to its bounty. It should know no castes, sects, 
creeds, or parties, and its chastising rod should fall only on 
those traitorous and rebellious sons who should refuse to ren- 
der obedience in those things in which it has an undoubted 
right to command. 

" Yet this unnatural parent has drawn a broad line of de- 
marcation between the children of the same household ; it has 
clothed one set in purple and fine hnen, and lodged them 
sumptuously, and it has degraded the others to a rank among 
its menials, banished them from its countenance and its regard, 
and even set a mark upon them to m.ake them objects of con- 
tempt and derision among men. And who are these who 
have been thus disowned by their kindred, disfranchised, and 
cut off from their rightful inheritance ? What has been their 
crime ? Have they been mutinous, rebellious, vicious or dis- 
honest ? Have they been lost to all sense of family pride and 
manifested a hopelessly depraved disposition ? History will 
record of them, that tliey yielded a ready obedience to the 
laws of the land ; that in all that can adorn and elevate our 
nature, they were never inferior to their brethren, and that 
their attachment to that country where they had been so illy 
treated was manifested by acts of self-devotion that would 
have Avon an honourable distinclion in the sternest days of the 
Roman republic. They see llieir country engaged in what 
they believe to be an unnecessary war ; they know that the 
most determined valour, the most untiring energy, and the 
most consummate skill will not win for them a single smile 
or encouraging Avord from their ungrateful parent, but frowns 
instead, reproaches and persecutions. They see their more 
favoured but not more deserving brethren advanced to all the 
high posts of honour and command, and under them, in a 
more humble capacity, they gather from the East and from 
the West, from the North and from the South, to the standard 
of their country, and they bear it in triumph from field to field 
of carnnge and o-lory. Treated at home as aliens, strangers, 
" ' 1 



S§ OPINIONS OF 

and menials, they readily espouse the quarrels of their per' 
verse, partial, and unjust guardian ; they cheerfully don the 
rude harness of the common soldier, and now on the hills and 
plains of Mexico, their bones lie bleaching from Palo Alto to 
Buena Vista, and from Vera Cruz to the famed Halls of the 
Montezumas ! Well, what did they get ? Since the war 
began, the President has had the appointment of six or eight 
brigadier, and three or four major-generals ; and in every in- 
stance he has appointed a politician of the Democratic school. 
lie has had the officering of eleven regiments entire, and of 
the four or five hundred officers, which these reo-iments re- 
quired, there were not half a dozen Whigs occupying posts 
higher than that of captain. The two great Generals of the re- 
gular army, Scott and Taylor, were Whigs : over the latter, 
during the whole of his career, a red was held ; he was more 
than once censured, and an attempt was even made to supplant 
him by a Democratic civilian and politician. Scott, upon the 
field of his glory, was suspended from his command ; but I 
will again take occasion to speak of these things. Have I not 
shown you how force has been used to change the political 
sentiments of the people ? Is this Democracy, or is it 
tyranny?" 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 



"Honest old Faneuil asks what is Democracy : that ques- 
tion has puzzled the world for m.any years, but here is the 
answer : [See Plate opposite.] 



CHAPTER IX. 

MODERN DEMOCRACY EXEMPLIFIED. 

The gray-haired Faneuil thus continued his discourse upon 
the character of American Democracy : " I have spoken," 
said he, " of the attempt to force popular sentiment, and of 
the immense sums of money that had been expended for such 
a purpose. I will next show how the popular Vv'ill has 
been thwarted, stifled, and disregarded ; nor shall I state any 
thing but what is based on undoubted authorit3\ My facts 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 41 

shall all be true as any of the facts of history ; my inferences 
are of course nny own, but I flatter myself they are just and 
natural. 

" I have already shown you that at the election in 1844, 
the great State of Pennsylvania, intending to sustain the tariff 
of 1842, was cheated out of its vote, and made to give its suf- 
frages for men who immediately began a war on its most 
cherished policy. At that election, Mr. Clay received 105 
electoral votes, and Mr. Polk 170 ; and from the returns of 
the polls for electors, it appeared that Mr. Polk did receive a 
majority of the popular vote. If he did, his majority was 
extremely small, and as the tariff of 1842 was the great mea- 
sure on which the election turned, and as that tariff was cer- 
tainly approved of by Pennsylvania, if not by other States 
that voted for Polk, it was clear for him to see that a majority 
of the people were for the measure. The sub-treasury, as I 
have already told you, was first passed under the adminis- 
tration of Mr. Van Buren, and this gentleman, in the year 
1840, was again a candidate for the presidency, and staked 
his success chiefly upcn the popularity of his financial scheme. 
This treasury project was in fact the main issue between the 
rival candidates, and it was therefore fairly put before the 
country. . Nineteen States went for General Harrison, giving 
him 234 electoral votes : seven States, with (50 electoral 
votes, gave meagre majorities for the sage of Kinderhook and 
his financial pet. General Harrison lacked only six votes to 
give him four times as many as Avere received by his op- 
ponent ; and many of the States which went for him gave 
immense majorities in his favour. As far as I have been 
able to learn, the sub-treasury was not an issue at the last 
election; it never had been before the disastrous rout of 
1840, and it is therefore foir to conclude that it has been con- 
demned in the most unqualified manner, by a tremendous, an 
overwhelming majority of the free people of the United 
States. In the face of this, the sovereign will, so emphati- 
cally and plainly expressed, this same odious and popularly- 
doomed measure is revived by our present Democratic admi- 
nistration, and is now^ actually the law of the land ! Was 
the almost unanimous and loudly expressed will of a nation 
ever so entirel}^ disregarded, so utterly despised by those who 
held the reins of power ? 

" When our federal Constitution was formed, the leading 
statesmen of the country were divided into two parties, and 
these parties remained distinct and antagonistic until about 

4- 



42 OPINIONS OF 

the time of the election of John Gluinc}'- Adams to the presi- 
dency. One of these parties wished the powers of the fede- 
ral government to be greater than they are, and this party 
became known as the Federalists. They originally desired 
to see the President invested with some of the prerogatives 
of a constitutional king ; but the liberal sentiment prevailed 
to such an extent that the chief magistrate was stripped of 
every badge of royalty except the veto power. Our republic 
was an experiment ; there were then no other repubhcs, and 
we had been used to a monarchical form of government ; and 
hence it was that very many irien doubted the practicability 
of a complete republic. They could not all at once cut them- 
selves loose from old forms and old prejudices ; but it cannot 
be doubted that if a convention were now to sit to remodel 
the Constitution, and if party spirit could be banished from 
its deliberations, that it would for a moment tolerate a propo- 
sition to continue this veto poAver in our Presidents. It is 
anti-republican in the extreme — it is an odious relic of the 
fast-exploding, slavish institutions of the past, and is at war 
with the spirit of the age, all over the world. It in fact makes 
the President a despot ; for by his individual will he can 
nullify the will of the nation ; and therefore it is that no wise 
and patriotic executive would dare to apply it, unless in one 
of those possible, but not often-occurring cases, when the 
people and their representatives are clearly mad. But even, 
in such a case, is it not a dangerous, a most hazardous, expe- 
riment to allow only one man to be the interpreter of the 
Constitution, the judge of the country's wants, and the arbi- 
ter of its destinies ? 

" Which is more hkely to happen, the periodical insanity 
of a nation or of any one individual, be he ever so wise and 
learned, temperate, and prudent ? 

" Which is more likely to understand the people's wants 
and interest, they themselves or those who govern them, and 
wish to retain their power of governing ? 

" These considerations, I am inclined to think, as well as 
a proper respect for the real spirit of our institutions, would, 
at the present day, deter any good and wise man from the 
use of the veto power. 

" I have heard of a lunatic who declared that he was con- 
fined on account of a difference of opinion. 'The world 
says I am mad,' said he, ' but I believe the world to be de- 
ranged.' 

♦' So, doubtless, think all monarchs, despots, and autocrats: 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 43 

they believe, or make it convenient to believe, that they only 
know what is good for their respective nations, whom, like 
great families of lunatics, they keep confined, or, what is the 
same thing, in a state of bondage. Here it is customary, and 
perhaps it would be everywhere safest, to let the nation rule 
the individual, and to confine him, too, when he sets up 
pretensions inconsistent with what that nation believes to be 
its rights, its wants, and its interests 

"Now, our present democratic President has, in his ima- 
gined wisdom, three times, in the course of four years, made 
use of the veto power ; has three times solemnly determined 
that the majority of this great, free, and enhghtened peo- 
ple had mistaken their true interests, and three times, there- 
fore, assumed the kingly responsibility of suspending the 
national will. He may have been honest, but was he wise, 
thus arrogantly to declare that he knew more than the nation, 
and that he had more regard for the national interest than the 
nation itself had ? I say he may have been honest, but some 
of his acts would seem to make his words an insulting 
mockery. 

" There was a bill passed by the last Congress making ap- 
propriations for the improvement of the navigation of our great 
rivers, for the building of harbours on the lakes, &c. ; all works 
in which the prosperity of the nation was immediately and 
deeply concerned. Mr. Polk refused to sanction this bill, and 
he returned it with a long and laboured message, exhibiting the 
most dehcate constitutional scruples, a most squeamish desire 
not to permit the slightest possible infraction of the sacred 
charter of our liberties. At the very time that he was sphtting 
the hairs which compose the texture of this elaborate docu- 
ment, he was, on his own responsibility^, and without the 
knowledge or implied consent of Congress, fitting out an ex- 
pensive naval expedition to explore the Dead Sea! The idea 
of allowing Congress, the people's representatives, to expend 
money for the purpose of facilitating the commercial inter- 
course between our States, of developing our resources, and 
protecting our interests, filled his conscientious soul with holy 
horror, while it can see not the slightest impropriety in the 
expenditure of thousands on thousands to fish up relics of 
Sodom and Gom.orrah, wherewith to adorn the mantelpiece 
of the presidential mansion. There hangs the map before 
you ; and if you will examine it, you will find in the interior 
of Asia, just above the desert of Arabia, and in the midst of the 
bleak haunts of wild aiul vvandrrinvf tTibes, the receptacle of 



44 OPINIONS OF 

the unnavigable river Jordan. It is a dark and dismal lake of 
bituminous and viscid water, on whose bosom no vessel has 
ever floated or will ever float, and on whose naked, drear, 
and volcanic shores, a sad and silent desolation reigns. This 
is the Dead Sea, whose gloomy waters now cover the site of 
those wicked cities on which God, in his wrath, rained from 
heaven fire and brimstone ; and this is the spot around which 
the thoughts of our antiquarian President linger with a fond 
and sacred interest. Perhaps he wishes to shed a new hght 
on the book of CTenesis, giving it the sanction of his own high 
authority ; or perhaps he wishes to veto the history of Moses, 
and illumine the world with a more constitutional and demo- 
cratic account of those early transactions of our race, over 
which Time has thrown his hallowing veil of misty tradition. 
Whatever be his object — whether it be to fish for curiosities 
for a cabinet, to confirm or refute Scripture^ or to annex ter- 
ritories, I wish to know the authority for it. Under what 
clause of the Constitution is it that the President is justified 
in sending our navy to dive for relics of engulphed cities, or 
drag the Red Sea for the chariot-wheels of Pharaoh and his 
host ? One is as proper, and useful, and constitutional as the 
other, and he may do either ^ust as well as dig a canal or 
build a railroad across the isthmus of Tehuantepec, from the 
Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean. This last, we all know, 
is a measure which our rulers have much at heart, impelled 
by a philanthropy as broad as it is disinterested, for the isth- 
mus with the hard name is as yet undisputed foreign terri- 
tory. What a government is ours ! How does it fling ofT 
the narrow prejudices which bind men to hom.e and kindred, 
and, disdaining to shed its benefactions on its own people, it 
embraces the earth in the wide scope of its benevolence, and 
like a true knight-errant, scours the whole Avorld in search of 
useful employment ! Prepared to redress all wrongs, to re- 
pair all injuries, it has thrown down its gauntlet to the op- 
pressors, the tyrants, the enchanters, goblins, and devils, in 
every corner of the globe ; and to enable it the more effectu- 
ally to vanquish and exterminate all these foreign evils, it 
must not waste its time and means on the paltry things at 
home. It is a peregrinating Hercules, who knows no home, 
and it is ready, without fee and without reward, to take a 
hand at the cleansing of Augean stables, the strangling of 
lions, the destruction of hydras, and the taming of wild bulls 
in any part of the globe. 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 45 

" Yes, it is a peripatetic govemnient ; and on the shores of 
tlie Dead Sea, in the wilds of Syria, on the borders, of the 
Pacitic, in Mexico, in Rome, and in Yucatan, its boundless 
beneficence is felt ; but it has not a smile or a dollar for our 
own bright, broad, and commerce-covered lakes, and our own 
majestic and city-margined rivers ! 

'• Oh, shame, where is thy blush !" 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

Modern democracy exempHfied ! I should like exceed- 
infrly to see it worked out in figures, and set in a book : what 
a "tremendous amount of ciphering it would take I Mr. 
Walker, great as he is at arithmetic, would find it no child's 
plav to solve the following problems : 

If the sub-treasury is not a government bank, what is it ? 

If Democracy is the power of one man, what is Despot- 



ism 



? 



If to forbid the will of the nation is republican, what is 
anti-republican ? 

If it takes a large standing army, and constant fighting to 
keep peace, what is war ? 

A thousand other and tougher questions might be asked, 
but I have not time. In the mean time, I must express my 
regret that Mr. Faneuil, while illustrating Democracy, did not 
recur to those glorious times when the famous leg-treasurers 
of Mr. Van Buren flourished so extensively. - Honest Levi 
Woodbury, the Secretary of the Treasury, treated those huge 
rogues with commendable tenderness ; he coaxed and per- 
suaded, but, the rascals ! they would steal. 

Perhaps it was to prevent the recurrence of similar 
scenes that Mr. Polk hit on the Mexican war as a means 
whereby the contents of the treasury might lawfully be dis- 
tributed among his friends. If this be the case, it throws a 
new light on the origin of the war, and reflects great credit 
both on the ingenuity and the patriotism of the Duck river 
Colonel. 

Alas ! however, whether we have leg-treasurers or wars, 
your Unc/e Sam has to groan ! 



46 OPINIONS OF 

CHAPTER X. 

A NEW ISSUE. 

" I think," said Jonathan Faneuil, " that I have now given 
you good and substantial reasons for the faith that is in me. I 
think I have fairly, though briefly, compared Whig and 
Democratic measures, and Whig and Democratic principles ; 
but as to men, I have had little to say. This is a theme on 
which I could dwell at length ; but I dislike to bring charges 
against my fellow mortals, and I leave them to be judged by 
God, who sees the hearts of all. There is one man, how- 
ever, to whom I have made allusion more than once, and 
whose position demands that I should give him a more ex- 
tended notice. He was the nominee of the Democratic party 
for President ; he was elected President by that party, and 
they have endorsed and sustained his official acts. He may 
therefore be regarded as the present embodiment of the prin- 
ciples of that faction, and, as such, I shall make him and his 
acts the subject of the remainder of my discourse. He is the 
last and present embodiment of the spirit of Democracy ; but 
it is proper I should say to you that this spirit has shifted and 
varied its forms as often as did the famed and fabled Proteus, 
and 

' The moment you had pronounced him one — 
Presto ! his face changed, and he was another.' 

"It is in onie sense a progressive spirit; that is, it is in a 
state of perpetual ^ran^ition, like the winds of a blusterous 
April morning; and the- '^'isest men can only tell wliere it 
now is and what it now is, but cannot foretell its position an 
hour hence, and whether it will be gentle or stormy, cold or 
warm. What is it now ? It has overspread the political 
heavens with blackness ; and so gloomy and threatening 
seem the elements, that the countenances of the good and 
prudent part of the nation are " sickhed over with the pale cast 
of thought," and men hold their breath and looi "earfuUy 
about them, as they do when a storm is gathering over them. 
The fitful, shifting, and uncertain wind does indeed aptly 
represent this spirit ; and it now sweeps from the South, 
whence it comes a fierce sirocco, with a steammg breath, and 
shaking deadly poisons from its cloudy wings. It is the 
furious South, ih^ fur ens ausier, so dreaded by the ancient 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 47 

mariners, and before \thich fleets and navies are scattered 
and wrecked. It comes, driving before it dense volumes of 
black and billowy vapours, and uttering- the deep growl of 
an angry tempest. It moans dismally through the rigging 
of our ship of state ; the element on which it rides begins to 
foam and toss with a restive spirit, and the coming storm has 
cast its dark shadow on the heart of the aged and cautious 
sailor. May Gorf have mercy on us when the tempest bursts 
in its fury ! 

" All other points of difference between the parties are now 
forgotten ; ail other issues are swallowed up by that porten- 
tous one which now lifts high its hideous head, and, like 
the horn in the vision of Daniel, would even cast down the 
stars and host of Heaven and stan)p upon them. But to 
begin at the beginning : 

" The old issues of Bank, TariiT, Distribution of the Proceeds of 
the Public Lands, &c., had been so long before the country, that, 
as I truly believe, the people, from increasing light, were begin- 
ning to agree upon them. It was, as I sincerely think, mani- 
fest during the early part of the year 1844 that the nation 
would, at the coming elections, sustain the principles for 
which the Whigs had contended for many years. Some time 
before this, some restless and scheming politicians had endea- 
voured to build themselves up with a new party by a new 
political project; and these politicians, as you will all recol- 
lect, were headed by Tyler, and their project was the imme- 
diate annexation of the republic of Texas to that of the United 
States. The question was thought to be a momentous one, 
and the real and nominal head of the Democratic party, im- 
pelled by a high secse of the duties -Vnposed by his position, 
came out in a letter declaring his '^ppDsition to the measure. 
It was one of those Vv'-ild and apparently grand schemes likely 
to excite and captivate the unthinking portion of the commu- 
nity, and the old and patriotic men of both parties united in 
efforts to prevent the rousing of a spirit, which in all ages and 
countries ha^,. proved dangerous and ungovernable. The 
moment, however, that Mr. Van Buren broke ground against 
the annex in of Texas, a host of minor politicians took an 
opposite position, and among these were James K. Polk, a 
party tactician of considerable note. 

"The Democratic National Convention, which was held in 
Baltimore in 1844, actuated, not by an unpatriotic spirit, but 
chiefly solicitous about the temporary success of their party, 
and perhaps, at the time, having nothing else much at heart, 



48 OPINIONS OP 

solemnly resolved to make this amiexation project one of their 
issues. Their hopes of success on other questions were 
gloomy enough ; and with a fatal rashness they determined 
to invoke the aid of a wild demon, which is dangerous alike 
to friend and foe, and which ever has proved, and ever will 
prove, itself too mighty for those, who conjure it up. The 
appeal to it is like the appeal to that element which is said to 
be a good servant, but a hard master. If the city council of 
Nev/ York, desired to move old buildings and rubbish from the 
heart of the city, they might, on a windy day, speedily effect 
their purpose by applying the torch to the ruins ; but the fiery 
element would not stop when its task was finished, but would 
then bid defiance to those who had resorted to its aid, and 
leaping from house to house, and becoming still more and 
more voracious from the food on which it fed, sweep with de- 
solating fury over the city. This homely illustration will give 
you a good idea of the course pursued by those Democrats 
who met in council in Baltimore four years ago. They re- 
solved to have recourse to a spirit which becomes more greedy 
from that which it devours, and whose keen appetites worlds 
w^ould not satiate. In a word, tliey resolved to appeal to that 
love of progress, of expansion, with which all men are easily 
deluded, to waken in the hearts of their countrymen the natu- 
ral lust of conquest and universal dominion. 

" The force of this strong passion roused for the occasion, 
w^ould, it was thought, carry the party into power ; and ac- 
cordingly Mr. Tyler v/as robbed of his thunder, as it was 
called, and it was placed at the service of Mr. Polk, one of the 
inferior politicians, who cannot hope to rise to exalted station 
except by becoming the advocates of measures and systems 
so wild and desperate as to be repudiated by greater and bet- 
ter men. 

" Thi-s unhappy scheme, intended for a temporary purpose, 
was fraught with the most stupendous, the most direful and 
pernicious consequences to this nation, and, perhaps, to the 
world ; and of these, in their order, it is my purpose now to 
speak. The first, the most palpable objection to the measure, 
and the one obvious to every unprejudiced mind, was its im- 
mediate tendency to precipitate this country into a war with 
the neighbouring and sister republic of Mexico. Texas, and 
the parent State" from which it had revolted, were not on ami- 
cable terms with each other ; the latter still claimed the for- 
mer, and in the strongest manner protested against our annex- 
ation of what she called her rebellious province. Whethfr* 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 49 

Texas ought to have been nn independent State or not is a 
different matter; it was sufficient for us to know that its im- 
mediate absorption by this country would ])roduce a hostile 
collision between ourselves and Mexico. This w^ould have 
been the natural, the inevitable consequence of annexation at 
that time ; and as Ave could, by a little prudential policy, at a 
more convenient season, peaceably have acquired possession 
of the desired country, those who consummated the measure 
with such rash and reckless haste are fully responsible for the 
unhappy consequences, ^^t all events, then, Mr. Polk and 
the Democratic leaders are to blame for the war through 
tvhich loe have lately passed, even had their course, after an- 
nexation, been marked by ivisdom and forbearance. It is 
true, this wisdom and forbearance would have palliated the 
offence ; but still the party, or rather its leaders, would have 
been guilty. 

" Unhappily, however, no such quahties were displayed, but 
on the contrary, Mr. Polk exhibited a warlike disposition from 
the beginning, and so managed as to make himself again and 
doubly responsible for the war ; and of this you shall have 
abundant proof. It is pretended, I know, by ingenious sophis- 
ters and political casuists, that if annexation was a cause lead- 
ing to war, then Mr. Polk is free from the blame which has 
been imputed to him ; but this is a sublimated quibble which 
may satisfy the easy conscience of the President and his con- 
fessors, but will not, and cannot, affect the verdict of any inge- 
nuous soul. 

" Annexation would, in all probability, have produced a war ; 
but before the natural consequences of this project had had 
time to occur, our Chief Magistrate wilfully, or by his unfor- 
tunate blunders, precipitated a result of which he is therefore 
guilty. This is all very plain to those who wish to know the 
truth, and I trust I am not wasting my breath on any other 
sort." 



50 OPINIONS OF 



CHAPTER XL 

THE GAINS BY THE MEXICAN "WAR. 

" A WISE man declared that ' war is a game which if the 
people understood kings would not play at.' 

" Here, as you will observe, war is called a ga7n€, and a 
game of kings; and if you will believe an old man, the sen- 
tence is ti-ue and most happily worded. Since the days of 
Nimrod down to the present time, there have been few wars 
where the gains on either side amounted to one-tenth of the 
loss ; and still fewer in which the nations sustaining them 
had any thing to fight for but peace. This idea of ' conquer- 
ing a peace' is as old as the world itself, and has in all time 
been the stimulus by which m.onarchs and rulers have induced 
their subjects to tight with energy and perseverance. There 
is nothing so dear to wise men as peace. This is the syren 
song by w^hich nations have been lured on from battle-field to 
battle-field, from slaughter to slaughter; they were vainly 
pursuing peace, w^ith flouting banners and braying trumpets, 
with pikes, and swords, and javelins, and all the instruments 
of death. Thus it is, too, that by delusive pretences, and by 
the pomp and glitter with which they surround their pastime, 
kings and presidents are enabled to play at their favourite 
game ; and after tliey have indulged to satiety, the people, on 
whom have fallen all the burdens and all the losses, are glad 
enough to get peace for their share of the gains. 

" Well, Mr. Polk has for nearly two years amused himself 
w^ith this expensive, but, to him, diverting sport, and has moved 
the nation about as if it were a set of chess-men, to be picked 
up or cut to pieces at his pleasure ; and as the game is for 
the present over, let us now strike a rough balance-sheet of 
profits and losses, and see how they stand. 

" Mr. Polk's stake and gain is empire for himself and friends, 
and this is something considerable so far as he is concerned. 
He was wise enough to know that in times of war it is abso- 
lutely important that the government act with energy and 
promptness ; he knew that energy and promptness belong 
only to those systems where there are no free people to 
instruct, oppose and censure, and no free legislatures to deli- 
berate and doubt ; and hence, he knew, that while the war 
lasts, the President, from the necessity of the case, becomes 
an absolute and irresponsible sovereign. The emergency is 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 51 

great and pressing ; there is no time for hesitation, for speeches, 
for inquiries, investigations and resolutions ; vast armies are 
in the field and must be supported ; hordes of enemies are 
swarming about those armies, and must be promptly and 
vigorously pursued and beaten off or taken. In such cases, 
our republican President becomes an absolute autocrat, a dic- 
tator Avith unlimited powers ; the rights and will of Congress 
are suspended, and the people themselves not allowed to ques- 
tion or complain. 

" Thus Mr. Polk has had the pleasure of acting the Im- 
perator, the uncontrolled and uncontrollable monarch ; he has 
increased his patronage and added to the number of his friends. 
He has been enabled to spend some hundreds of thousands 
nn these latter; to shower honors, and ribbons, and principa- 
lities on them, and thus to surround his throne with a host of 
popular, devoted, and determined military chieftains, who owe 
their greatness to his benefactions. It is not in human nature 
to be ungrateful for such things, and doubtless Mr. Polk thinks 
he has commenced a dynasty whose prosperity is laid on sure 
foundations. So much for Mr. Polk's gains — Mr. Polk's friend 
and former partner in the practice of the law, Gideon J. Pillow, 
has, without much service or exposure in the ' tented field,' 
gained the high and illustrious post of Major-General in the 
army of the United States ; and Messrs. Q,uitman, Patterson, 
&c., likewise Mr. Polk's friends, have stepped from the walks 
of private life, and from their peaceful avocations, to similar 
stations of eminence. Mr. Polk's friends Persifer F. Smith, 
Caleb Cushing, Cadwallader, Pierce, Hopping, Lane, &c. &c., 
have each gained the office of Brigadier-General ; various 
captains and colonels have gained an honorable notoriety 
and slight promotions, and Scott and Taylor, the hatred of the 
President, the love of the nation, the respect of the world, 
and the admiration of posterity. 

" The army has gained the thanks of Congress, and the 
United States have o-ained New Mexico and California. Let 

O 

us add up the items and see what they amount to : 

"Of the extent and importance of Mr. Polk's acquisitions he 
is himself the best judge — and as no one but himself and his 
particular friends is interested in the matter, it is not necessary 
to say more about it. It is true it is the lion's share, but as it 
is a thing altogether personal to him.self, any further allusion to 
it might be considered as in bad taste. Equally indelicate and 
improper would it be to sum up the gains of Generals Pillow, 
Q,uitman, Patterson, Butler, Shields, Pierce, Smith, Hopping, 



52 OPINIONS OF 

Lane, Gad wallader, Gushing, Marshall, &c. &c. ; for what they 
have acquired, though it may have been at the general expense, 
is now their property and that of their children, who may, per- 
haps, form part of our future nobility. It would also be a need- 
less and perhaps a not very easy task to ascertain the sum total 
of all the glory won by our colonels, captains, and lieuten- 
ants ; or to show the amount of it which will fall to the share 
of each individual in the nation. It may do them, the officers, 
no little good; it may procure for them dinners, fetes, presents, 
pulfs and parties, the smiles of the fair, the respect of the 
brave and virtuous, and the adulation of the vagabond-rabble. 
It may, even without their desiring such a thing, give them 
exclusive privileges and make of them a titled and high 
aristocracy ; and doubtless it will be a great satisfaction to the 
civilians to be allowed to subscribe to the dinners, to run in 
the processions, and to shout the praises of these ghttering 
heroes, though, for myself, I do not consider that I have made 
a vast acquisition in having gained the privilege of being re- 
garded as the social inferior of every thing that Avears a metal 
button. It may be a ])leasure to some men to reflect that they 
are now allowed to assist at the deification of a whole race of 
fellow mortals ; but for me I can never experience the 
slightest satisfaction in being compelled to recognise a master, 
even though he wear a uniform and be blazing all over with 
gold and brass. 

" But it is said, this glory is the property of the nation. 
Indeed ! can it be coined into a circulating medium ? Will 
it answer the drafts of the Secretary of the Treasury ? Will it 
increase the wages of labour, purify the morals of the nation, 
diminish the number of paupers, or lighten the public taxes? 
Will it comfort and console the widow and the orphan; furnish 
bread and raiment to the poor and starving, or heal the wounds 
of a broken heart ! If this glory is the property of the nation, 
how can any individual make it available ? C-an any but 
Golonel May hiiuself draw upon his famous charge at the 
battle of Resaca ? Gan a beggar procure a penny for his 
share of Quitman's honours, or buy a loaf of bread by his 
interest in the glory of the battles of Mexico? Gommon 
property indeed ! this glory but degrades the general mass 
by the two great elevation which it gives to a few. 

" As to the gains of Scott and Taylor, I leave them to the 
pen of the future historian, and we will come now to the 
people's share of the booty. 

'* The state of New Mexico it is said contains two hundred 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 53 

and fourteen thousand and eight hundred (214,800) square 
miles of territory, and as there are six hundred and forty- 
acres to the square mile, this state contains about one hundred 
and thirty-seven millions, four hundred and seventy-two 
thousand (137,472,000) acres. All of this that does not 
belong to individuals is a gain to this country ; and if it were 
all public domain its value would be very moderate. It is a 
country of bleak and rugged mountains and of dry and sterile 
plains, with here and there a narrov/ stripe of green along the 
margin of some stream. Much the greater part of the 
country has been and will for ever be a desert ; a naked deso- 
lation, scorched by the fierce rays of a nearly vertical sun, 
and producing nothing but thorns, vipers, and poisonous in- 
sects. Nothing growls, nothing can grow, and nothing ever 
will grow in these waste and arid regions, and they will, like 
similar regions in Asia and Africa, remain a ' howling w^ilder- 
ness' till the end of time. 

'' After this description of the country, it will perhaps be 
gratifying to you to learn that there is not one foot of public 
land in this state, and that our government will not, therefore, 
have to be at the expense of keeping up land-offices in the 
desert. 

" Upper California, we are informed, contains three hun- 
dred and seventy-six thousand three hundred and forty-four 
(370,344) square miles ; and as we get parts of Cohuila and 
Chihuahua, we w^ill estimate these at sixty thousand (60,000) 
square miles. Here is a territory of four hundred and thirty- 
six thousand, three hundred and forty-four square miles, or 
two hundred and seventy-nine millions two hundred and sixty 
thousand, one hundred and sixty acres. There are some 
public lands in this state, and we will make a liberal calcula- 
tion and allow them to be one-seventh of the whole state, and 
this will leave us not quite thirty-nine millions eight hundred 
and ninety-five thousand (39,895,000) acres. Be it remem- 
bered here, that these lands have to be surveyed, and that 
they will have to support the expenses of survey ; and that 
they will also have to support a great number of officers in 
the shape of registers, receivers, agents, &c. What all these 
things Vv'ill probably amount to, and what the lands will be 
worth j)er acre, and how long it will be before they can be 
sold, I will endeavour to explain hereafter. It is supposed 
that thero are about twenty-two millions of inhabitants in the 
United States ; we will take this as true, and estimating the 
tax-payers at six million, the following sum will show you 

5* 



54 OPINIONS OF 

how mucli land oacli tax-payer will get. Here is the calcu- 
lation : — 

(50000,00 ) 898950,00 ( G 
800000 

88950 



(30000 

"Each head of a family and tax-payer will get six acres and 
not quite a half; six acres of land, the best of which is not as 
good as some of the public lands nearer home and in a better 
community and better climate, and which cannot be sold for 
one dollar and twent3^-hve cents an acre. Oh ! I forgot to 
say that we got some seventy or eighty thousand fellow-citi- 
zens, most of whom are lousy beggars, and all of whom aro 
thieves, and who are thus described by an impartial^ intelligent, 
and veracious traveller : — 

" 'It is remarkable that, althouo-h existing from the earliest 
times of the colonization of New Mexico, a period of two 
centuries, in a state of continual hostility with the numerous 
savage tribes of Indians who surround their territory, and in 
constant insecurity of life and property from their attacks ; 
being also far removed from the enervating influences of large 
cities, and, in their isolated situation, entirely dependent upon 
their own resources, the inhabitants are totally destitute of 
those qualities which, for the above reasons, we might naturally 
have expected to distinguish them, and are as dehcient in 
energy of character and physical courage as they are in all 
the jnoral and intellectual qualities. In their social state but 
one degree removed from the veriest savages, they might take 
a lesson even from these in morality and the conventional 
decencies of life. Imposing no restraint on their passions, a 
shameless and universal concubina""c exists, and a total dis- 
regard of moral laws, to which it would be impossible to find 
a parallel in any country calling itself civilized. A Avant of 
honourable principle, and consummate duplicity and treachery 
characterize all their dealings. Liars by nature, they are 
treacherous and faithless to their friends, cowardly and cring- 
ing to their enemies ; cruel, as all cowards are, they unite 
savage ferocity with their want of animal courage ; as an 
example of Avhich, their recent massacre of Governor Bent, 
and other Americans, may be given — one of a hundred 
instances.' — Ruxton.'' 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. bS 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

The old man Faneuil has not fairly computed the gains 
of the Mexican war. He has left out of his calculation my 
share of the profits — the share of your Uncle Sam. The 
Baltimore Convention of 1844 billeted on me for a four years' 
su})port one James K. Poilc ; and this Mr. Polk had the most 
numerous retinue or suite that ever was heard of, all to be main- 
tained, fed, clothed, lodged, and furnished with pocket-money 
at my expense. Excessively grateful for the unexpected ho- 
nour which the Convention conferred on him, he demanded of 
me an office for every member who had voted for him. After 
my hberahty and my means had been tried to the utmost — 
after my mansions were all full and running over, there were 
still many hungry adherents to be provided for, and every 
sort of cunning shift was resorted to to find accommodations 
for the poor creatures that still kept " knocking at the door." 
What was to be done ? I vras on the point of bankruptcy; 
the people, my nephews, were stingy, and your old uncle 
was in a dreadful bother — when lo ! a Daniel come to judg- 
ment. The war was hit on ; the patriotism., the combatism, 
and the plunderism oi the country, were roused up, and the 
Congress gave me millions on millions for the asking. Those 
who, with faces an ell long, had sat at the portals of my 
house, for days, and weeks, and months, begging for a situa- 
tion, or for old clothes, now found employment. They were 
dressed out in brass and gold, and made heroes and generals 
in a twinkhng. They asked for clerkships, and were made 
marshals. They begged for a few hundreds, and thousands 
were showered on them. Nor was this all. Mr. Polk, in 
his benevolence, intended to provide hx all his friends. It 
was his desire to make arrangements which might succes- 
sively ensure the presidency to each prominent man who had 
supported him. And first and foremost was to come in his 
old friend and partner, the immortal Pillow. And have not 
I, and has not the world, gained by the exploits of this illus- 
trious chief? Has he not enlightened mankind with new 
modes of warfare, offensive and defensive ? Has he not 
made himself and the American arms a terror to all nations, 
people and kindred ? How brightly will for ever shine, in 
the firmament of my glory, the incomparable and everlasting 
Gideon ! He is a tower of strength to the cause of liberty- 
he is worth more to me than an army with banners ! 



56 OPINIONS OF 

Two or three hundred millions, and thirty thousand Hves, 
are a cheap price for the accessiori of fame, secured to his 
native countr}^ by this matchless hero. I must groan here ! 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE LOSSES. 



" Having made a fair calculation of the gains, let us now 
endeavour to estimate the cost of this Mexican war. I say the 
cost simply — for who can tell the value of the losses we have 
incurred? Who will fix the price of the blood that has been 
spilled, of the lives that have been lost, of the hearts that 
have been broken ? Will any mathematician attempt to set 
down in figures the approximate value of the destitution, the 
heart-sickness, and the bereavements, that this war has 
caused ; of the hopes that it has blasted, of the wounds which 
it has inflicted on public and private morals, and of the long 
train of vices which will follow it ? How many infamous 
transactions have grown out of it; how many scoundrels 
have been enriched, and how many honest men cheated and 
ruined? How many sober men have been transformed to 
drunken vagabonds ; how many hopeful youths debauched, 
and how many acts of lawless violence, how many riots and 
murders, will, on the books of the recording angel, be charged 
to those Avho plunged us into this bloody controversy of 
arms ? These are questions w^hich none of us can answer, 
and the true answers to which cannot be comprehended by 
finite beings, for they involve infinite calculations, and require 
a more than mortal power of comprehension. We can, how- 
ever, see that the sum total is immense; that the account of 
losses will fill the legers of time for at least a century ; and 
that, even after the lapse of a hundred years, there will still 
be found new items to be added into the general amount. 
Leaving these to the clerks of time, the historians, to com- 
plete the register of incidental and miscellaneous charges for 
the inspection of our remote posterity, we will at once pay 
our respects to the Bill of Costs, immediate payment of which 
is demanded of the prosecutor in the suit. That you may 
not doubt the accuracy of my statements, my calculations 
will generally be based on the official statements of our 



OLD JONATHAN TANEUIL. 57 

rulers ; though I must be allowed to premise that it is natural 
to suppose that these men would conceal as much as possi- 
ble of those burdens which they have brought u})on the 
people. There have been very few public functionaries who 
have, all at once and voluntarily, made a full and fair exposi- 
tion of the public expenditures which they had caused; and 
certainly, in these times of high party excitement, and when 
every thing is done for party effect, it is not to be expected 
that Mr. Polk and his officers would frankly tell the nation 
how much their administration has cost us. It has been the 
custom of late years for the secretaries and clerks to exhibit 
their ingfenuitv in efforts to disguise the real state of the 

• •Till 

public finances ; and this habit is now considered, at least by 
those in power, as a justifiable piece of partisan trickery. I 
am yet to learn that Mr. Polk and his cabinet are better 
than their predecessors. I am yet to be convinced that they 
have not, from the beginning, been more completely the 
mere cunning heads of a party, scheming- all the while for 
party prosperity, than any public servants of whom I have 
ever heard or read in any country. 
According to Mr. Secretary Walker, the 
expenditures for the fiscal year ending- 
June 31, 1847, were - - - - $59,451,177 65 
Estimated expenditures to 30th June, 1848 58,615,6()0 07 
Estimated expenditures for the fiscal year 

ending 30th June, 1849 - - - 55,040,941 73 

$173,711,779 44 

" Thus, according to Mr. Walker, the expenditures of the 
government for three years can or will be one hundred and 
seventy-three millions seven hundred and eleven thousand 
seven hundred and seventy-nine dollars and forty-four cents. 
Taking the expenses of Mr. Tyler's administration as a fair 
test of what Mr. Polk's ought to have been, and probably 
would have been, in time of peace, we can arrive at some- 
thing approaching the cost of the war. 

" Allowing twenty-two millions a year (a very large allow- 
ance) for the cost of a peace establishment, the three years 
ending 30th of June, 1847, 1848, and 1849, would have been 
sixty-six millions. 

" On these data let us now cipher awhile : 

$173,711,779 44 
66,000,000 00 

$107,711,779 44 



58 OPINIONS OF 

One hundred and seven millions sev^en hundred and eleven 
thousand seven hundred and seventy-nine dollars and forty- 
four cents, is Mr. Walker's estimated cost of the war. 

" Now add to this the amount stipulated by the treaty to 
be paid to Mexico, which is fifteen miUions, and the amount 
which, by the same treaty, our government assumes to pay 
our own citizens, and which is something over five millions, 
but which I will put at five, and we have the following sum^ 

$107,711,779 44 

15,000,0(X) 00 
5,000,000 00 

$127,711,779 44 

" One hundred and twenty-seven millions seven hundred 
and eleven thousand seven hundred and seventy-nine dollars 
and forty-four cents, would be, according to Secretary Walker, 
the cost of the war, provided the claims which our citizens 
have against Mexico amounted to an even five millions. 

" I cannot just now lay my hand on any document con- 
taining a statement of the amount of those claims ; but you 
all know that it is considerably upwards of five millions, and 
more than enough to swell the sum, which I have stated as 
the cost of the war, to one hundred and twenty-eight milhons 
of dollars. Well, we supposed that the number of tax pay- 
ers in the United States was six millions, and, still taking it 
for granted that this estimate is correct, we will now try a 
sum in division. Six millions will go how often into one 
hundred and twenty-eight miUions ? Here is the sum worked 
out correctly : 

6,000000)128,000000 

211 

The quotient is twenty-one and a third ; that is, the Mexican 
war, according to Mr. Walker, would, if its expenses were 
now paid off, cost every tax payer in the United States at 
least twenty-one dollars and thirty-three and a third cents. I 
say, if its expenses were now paid ; but let us proceed with 
our calculations. Thirty-three millions of treasury notes 
have been issued, and this makes a national debt to that 
amount ; and, according to this charming Mr. Secretary 
Walker, the excess of expenditures over receipts for the year 
ending June 80, 1848, was $15,729,114 27, (fifteen miUions 
seven hundred and twenty-nine thousand one hundred and 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 59 

fourteen dollars and twenty-seven cents.) This might safely 
be set down at sixteen millions ; but I will make it fifteen, 
which, added to thirty-three, makes forty-eip;ht millions of a 
known existing national debt. I will take it as certain that 
not one cent of this will be paid off in twenty-five years, and 
I will give my reasons. 

. " 1st. There is every probability that the army will go on 
increasing. This year it is eighteen thousand five hundred 
stronger than it was last year, and ten additional regiments 
have earnestly been called for by the President. 

"2d. There are now a large number of vacancies, in the 
army, regular and volunteer, to be filled, and the President 
is endeavouring to fill them. 

"8d. Every year the President endeavours to increase his 
patronage by an increase of public offices, military and civil, 
and which are of little real utility. Witness the mission to 
Home, the lieutenant-generalcy, &c. &c. 

" 4th. Our revenue must diminish, unless the tariff policy- 
is altered. 

"5th. The incidental and miscellaneous expenses of this 
war, in the shape of pay for horses, provisions, Avagons, losses, 
injuries, &c. &c., will continue for years to be a heavy drain 
on the Treasury. I am told that the committee on claims in 
the present Congress has its hands full ; and I am well as- 
sured that their successors will find their places no sinecures. 
Thousands on thousands of claims for every species of less 
and damage, and from every quarter, will be annually sent in 
and proven ; nor will Congress ever cease making appropria- 
tions for such things until the lapse of a long series of j^ears 
will have the effect of a statute of limitations. For all these 
reasons, and many others Avhich I could assign, I conclude 
that the regular revenue of the government will not be 
greater than, if it is even equal to, the regular expenditures. 
I Vvdll, therefore, conclude that we will have to pay interest 
on our debt of forty-eight millions for tvv^enty-five or thirty 
years ; and who will gainsay this conclusion ? The interest 
on forty-eight millions for one year is two millions eight hun- 
dred and eighty thousand dollars ; and this, multiplied by 
thirty, amounts to seventy-six millions four hundred thou- 
sand. 

" There is another item still to be added on. The pension 
list will be trebled, if it is not quadrupled, for an usual num- 
ber of those in service have been disabled. You all know, 
perhaps, that those disabled, while in the service of the United 



CO OPINIONS OF 

States, are entitled to a certain provision ; and you must 
know that immense accessions have been added to this hst 
during the twenty months of Mexican war. We will there- 
fore assume that the appropriations for pensions will, for the 
next thirty years, be increased from one to three milhons, 
being an increase of two millions, and then we will get the 
.following sum : 
Interest on public debt of $48,000,000 for ' 

thirty years $76,400,000 

Two millions a year for increased number of 

pensioners for 30 years - - - $60,000,000 

$136,400,000 
There is still another item, to wit, the bounties, in public lands, 
granted to our volunteers. These were one hundred and sixty 
acres of land to each volunteer — and the whole number of 
volunteers cannot fall short of seventy odd thousand. I will 
put them however at 60,000; and this jnultiplied by 160 
gives 9,600,000 (nine million six hundred thousand) acres. 
The government price is $1 25 per acre, and therefore these 
nine millions six hundred thousand acres are worth exactly 
twelve millions of dollars. These twelve millions added to 
136 millions make 148 millions ; and granting that the number 
of tax-payers will increase before this debt is paid off, we will 
suppose the burden to fall on eight millions of souls — 

8,000000 ) 1 48^000000 (18:} 

_8 ' ■ 

68 
64 



Here we have eighteen and a half dollars to be added to 
the amount which I have before shown that each tax-payer 
has to pay, which amount is 21 and one-third dollars. Leav- 
ino- out the fractions, we get this sum 21 

18 

39 ; that is thirty-nine 
dollars as the very least cost of the war on each tax-payer in 
the Union. For this the tax-payer would get six and a 
half acres of land, if the public lands in our new acquisi- 
tion were to be divided ; but they belong to our government. 
Does the government need them to supply our increasing 
population ? By the last report of the Secretary of the 
Treasury now before me, I see that we yet own within the 
limits of the Union hundreds on hundreds of millions of public 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 61 

lands, an almost incalculable amount; and these lands are 
many of them of excellent quality and lying in settled States, 
where the society, the laws, and the climate are good, and 
where there are excellent Avater communications with market 
towns. But, it may be said, the income from these new 
public lands will relieve us from debt. Let us see : By Mr. 
Walker's Report it appears that the whole revenLie arising 
from the sales of the public lands for the last year was only 
a little over two millions of dollars ; and these lands are in 
every respect more desirable and sell faster than will the 
arid and waste domain of chaparral and thistles, which we 
have lately acquired. Nor is this all: these new lands have 
to be surveyed ; land-offices will have to be estabhshed among 
them, and land receivers and registers appointed, and all this 
will cost money, and the money will come out of the pockets 
of the tax-payers. Here is the report of the acting Secretary 
of the Treasury for 1847, and by it I see that in Michigan, 
(I open the book at random and am now at page 80,) I see 
here that in Michigan the cost of survey per mile is estimated 
at six dollars. In Mexico, all things counted, it will cost ten 
dollars at least. Well, as there are no public lands in New 
Mexico, we will only count the cost of survey of California, 
and here it is : the territory embraces about 876,o44 square 
miles, and we have got about 60,000 square m.iles from Chi- 
huahua and Cohuila — making in all 436,344 square miles to 
be surveyed. 1'his multiphed by ten makes four millions three 
hundred and sixty-three thousand four hundred and forty dol- 
lars ($4,363,440. )' When will the public lands in this region 
pay this cost? Never, never. Here is some authentic infor- 
mation in regard to their value collected by that able and 
industrious man, Truman Smith of Connecticut. A distin- 
guished mihtary friend of his writes : 

'"Nothing strikes an American eye sooner, or more strongly, 
than the denuded landscape everyAvhere presented to his view 
in Northern Mexico. From the banks of the Rio Grande, 
which are thinly wooded, until you reach the Sierra, scarcely 
a forest tree is found cf any size. The "musquit," a dwarfish 
tree, good fuel, but too short and crooked to be easily used in 
building, is found near the streanis, and occasionally on the 
tables which separate them : but the face of the country is 
generally covered with a low groAvth of thorny bushes and 
prickly pear, knov/n under the 'generic term of chaparral, 
and totally unfit for any civilized use. The table-land about 
Saltillo generally bears the same character. Timber, some- 

6 



G2 OPINIONS OF 

times of good size and length, is found in the recesses of the 
mountains. It is true that fuel is not so much needed in 
Mexico as with us, nor is it so much used ; but it is also true 
that, for the Avant of these elements, the population actually 
experiences no little suffering and disccmfort. Indeed, com- 
fort, in our acceptation, is unknown in that country. 

" ' On the whole, I Avould say that, with all the advantages 
of climate and good soil, the States in question offer no induce- 
ments to the American fanner. Except near the streams 
there can be no extensive cultivation, and on the banks irri- 
gation must be employed — an insuperable obstacle, it seems 
to me, to the settlement of the country, by our people, so 
long as any part of .the Mississippi valley remains unoccu- 
pied. 

" ' The m^ode of cultivaticn is as rude as possible amono- the 
great mass of the people. The hoe is unknow^n, and the 
ploughs are no better than those the Egyptians used in patri- 
archal times. There has been no progress in husbandry 
for two hundred years, and the whole aspect of the country 
denotes decay and retrogression. 

" ' There may be some mineral w^ealth in this region, and 
mines of silver were once wrought near Cerralvo, and at other 
points, but, from the fact that they have been long closed, 
I infer that they could not have been very rich. Indian 
depredations are alleged as the cause of their abandon- 
m.ent.' 

"Colonel Hardin, who fell in the battle of Buena Vista, wrote: 

" ' The whole country is miserably tvafqyed. Txirge dis- 
tricts have no luater at all. The streams are small aiid at great 
distances apart. One day we marched, on the road from 
Monclova to Parras, thirty-Jive miles without water — a pretty 
severe day's march for infantry. 

"'Grass is very scarce, and indeed there is none at all in 
man}' regions for miles square. Its place is supplied with 
prickly pear and thorn)^ bushes. There is not one acre in 
two hundred, more probably not one in five hundred, of all 
the land we have seen in Mexico, which can ever be cultivated ; 
the greater portion of it is the most desolate region I ever 
could have imagined. The pure granite hills of New Eng- 
land are a paradise to it, for they are without the thorny 
briers and venomous reptiles which infest the barbed bar- 
renness of Mexico. The good land and cultivated spots in 
Mexico are but dots on the map. Were it not that it takes 
so very little to support a Mexican, and that the land which 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 63 

is cultivated yields its produce with little labour, it would be 
surprising how its sparse population is sustained. All the 
towns we have visited, with perhaps the exception of Parras, 
are depopulating, as is also the whole country. 

" ' The people are on par v/ith their land. One in 200 or 
500 is rich, and lives like a nabob ; the rest are peons, or 
servants sold for debt, who work for their masters, and are 
as subservient as the slaves of the South, and look like In- 
dians, and, indeed, are not more capable of seif-government. 
One man. Jacobus Sanchez, owns three-fourths of all the land 
our column has passed over in Mexico. We are told we have 
seen the best part of Northern Mexico ; if so, the whole of it 
is not worth much. 

" ' I came to Mexico in favour of getting or takinfj enoucrh 
of it to pay the expenses of the war. I now doubt whether 
all Northern Mexico is worth the expense of our column of 
8000 men. The expenses of the war rnust be enormous ; 
we have paid enormous prices for every thing — much beyond 
the usual prices of the couPilry. Our march has been no in- 
jury, but indeed a benefit to that portion of the country our 
column passed through. The Mexicans have had no motive 
to wish for peace ; they have made money while our govern- 
ment has paid the piper.' 

" Lieut. Blake, in an official report to Col. Abert, chief of 
the topographical engineers, said of the country between the 
Nueces and the Rio Grande : 

" ' The route from Corpus Christi to the Arroyo Colorado 
may be divided into three parts : 

"' 1st. From Corpus Christi to the Santa Rosa ponds, 66 
miles. 

" ' 2d. From Santa Rosa ponds to Los Animos, 37 miles. 

" ' 3d. From Los Animos to the Colorado, 26 miles. -. 

"'The first division consists generally of flat prairie land, 
relieved by shghtly undulating prairie dotted with numerous 
small motles or clumps of dwarf timber (principally musquit 
and hackberry) on the immediate banks of the streams, ge- 
nerally small, and in many places merely a succession of 
ponds ; there is sufficient wood for camp purposes, the Es- 
condido and Bobido excepted. The road throughout the en- 
tire distance is excellent, with the exception of about two 
miles of hog wallow prairie between the Nueces and Agua 
Dulce ; this bad portion increasing in extent as you approach 
the coast. The water in the stream.s is generally slightly 
brackish, the best water being found in ponds on the route. 



64 OPINIONS OF 

Large herds of deer and mustangs are seen in this portion of 
the country. 

" ' The 2d division is more barren and sterile than the first. 
At the Santa Rosa ponds the road begins to be very sandy 
and heavy ; numerous salt ponds are found on the route, and 
fresh water only at long intervals. At the Encinal the live- 
oak groves make their appearance, and the ground is much 
cut up by salamanders and gophers. From the 84th to the 
i)8th mile, the route is a perfect desert ; no Avood, water, or 
grass ; salt ponds are frequent, and the road exceedingly 
heavy. On reaching the Chilterpins, fresh water in ponds is 
found, the road begins to improve, and at Los Animos (an old 
ranche) the difficult part of the route for wheeled vehicles ter- 
minates. 

" ' The 3d division resembles somewhat the first, there being; 
however a greater quantity of wood, principally musquit, and 
the ground, as in the 1st division, covered with sweet-scented 
flowers. Frcsli water in ponds is found at short intervals, 
with large droves of wild cattle on the praries. The road 
skirts the musquit on the right, the prairie extending thence 
to Laguna Mad re on the left. 

" ' From t]ie Colorado to the Rio Gmnde opposite Matamoras, 
distant thirty miles, the country is similar to the third division, 
the road passing through musquit and chaparral, while to the 
left in the direction of Frontone, the country is more open, 
with wood and water sufficient for all the purposes of 
camp.' 

" Lieut. Peck thus writes of New Mexico : 
" ' With respect to the connection of New Mexico with other 
parts of the continent : First, The nearest settlements to the 
west are those on the Pacific, distant six or seven hundred 
miles, and separated by a desert, with reference to which Kit 
Carson remarked, " that any party crossing it was bound to 
eat mule." 2d, The town of Chihuahua is distant from the most 
southern settlement of New Mexico 420 miles, and most of 
the intervening country is desert. The traders are usually 
from thirty to forty days transporting loads from Santa Fe 
to Chihuahua. 3d, To the east, the nearest settlements at 
present are on our own western border, the distance from 
Fort Leavenworth being 873 miles via Bent's fort. In course 
of time, our western settlements may be extended some two 
or three hundred miles westward to the eastern borders of the 
great desert ; still there will be over five hundred miles port- 
age. Thus we may consider New Mexico as completely 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. G5 

isolated from the rest of the continent. I would make a few 
remarks on the route from our nearest settlement to Santa Fe, 
but that route has been so often reported on that I could add 
little new. From the "Caches" on the Arkansas westward, 
the road by the Cimmaron lies through a desolate country. 
in fact, from this point till you reach the lower spring on the 
Cimmaron, or a distance of 125 miles, there is not a stick of 
wood with which the traveller can make a fire, even to make 
a cup of coffee ; and from this point for the next 150 miles, 
there is not more than four or five places where wood can be 
obtained ; the dried dung of animals has to be substituted 
when it can be obtained. Water is nearly as scarce as wood. 
By Bent's fort the route is better, but still any thing but 
good . 

"'I have omitted speaking of the mineral resources of New 
Mexico for the present. Many minerals, as iron, copper, and 
lead, occur in the mountains : but situated at the distance 
thev are from the markets of the world, they will hardly 
be \vronght. In truth, the cost of transportation to the 
United States v/ould be much greater than their value when 
brought here.' 

" And of Upper California I will read a few pages from the 
speech of Mr. Smith. 

" ' 1. The country on the Colorado is nearly in the form of 
an equilateral triangle, the base of which (this side of the 
Colorado) rests on the river Gila, and its apex m^ay be found 
in the Rocky Mountains, at or near the sources of the first 
named river. The base runs over near nine degrees of longi- 
tude, and a line drawn from the centre thereof to the apex 
would extend through about the same number of degrees of 
latitude. High mountains on the east separate it from New 
Mexico, on the north from Oregon, and on the west from the 
great Cahfornian basin. 

" 'The territory comprehended within the limits indicated, 
Mr. Farnham, in"' his "Life and Adventures in California," 
characterizes as being "a howling desolation." He then 
quotes extensively from Observations on the Country, which 
had been furnished him by Doctor Lyman, of Buffilo, who, 
in 1841, passed down the Colorado from its source, and 
through its whole extent. The doctor sajs, that " the water, 
in nearly every instance, after leaving the crossing of the 
Colorado in latitude 38° north, down to^he Californian moun- 
tains," (which are opposite the mouth of the Colorado,) 
"a distance of seven or eight hundred miles, is either very 



66 OPINIONS OF 

brackish or slimy, or so excessively saline as to have, in 
many instances, a fatal effect on animals and men ; in some 
few instances, indeed, good waters are found, but, like visits 
from the world above, they are " few and far between." Some- 
times, too, the traveller crosses vast barren plains utterly 
destitute of water, and upon which vegetation is so scarce 
"that there Avill hardly be a blade of grass to a square mile of 
surface ! Occasionally wild sage is met with, but almost 
destitute of foliage ; this, and the barren stems of other 
equally naked bushes, constitute the only food of wayfaring 
animals on these wastes. There are a few spots in this for- 
saken region where nature has attempted to checker its deso- 
lation with greenness." " Ponds of salt water occasionally 
occur, around which there is a scanty supply of coarse vege- 
tation. Over these dreadful wastes — scathed of God — is, 
however, everywhere found a gcanty supply of the wild 
squash, which serves only to tantalize the perishing traveller 
with the remembrance of fruitful fields and pleasant hours.'/ 

" ' Doctor Lyman,' says Farnham, ' suffered so many hard- 
ships while travelling down the Colorado, that he, as well as 
his animals, barely lived to reach the green field and pure 
waters of the Californian mountains. He found the country 
around the mouth of the river as dry as salt, and as uninvit- 
ing, in ev^ery respect, as any he had traversed.' 

" ' But I wish to call the attention of the committee to 
another authority, which I am sure must command their 
entire confidence ; it is the report of Colonel Emory, already 
referred to, when speaking of Sonora, who accompanied 
General Kearney in the fall of 1846 from the United States 
to California ; the general, with his forces, crossed the 
Arkansas at about the 104th parallel of west longitude from 
London, at a point where that river constitutes a part of the 
boundary between the United States and Mexico, and pro- 
ceeded from thence, in a south-westerly direction, to the Rio 
Grande, and (crossing that river) down on its right bank to 
about the parallel of 33° north latitude, when he turned sud- 
denly to the right, crossed the mountains, and threw himself 
on the waters of the Gila, and then traversed the whole base 
of the triangle already alluded to, by marching down the 
latter river on its north bank to the Colorado, and thence in a 
course nearly west to San Diego on the Pacific. This gave 
Colonel Emory a good opportunity to observe the country 
which constitutes that base ; and let the following extracts 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 67 

from his report tell the story of its probable benefits to the 
American people : — 

" ^Nov. 13, 1846. — At 12 o'clock, after giving our horses 
a last watering, we started off in a south-west direction to 
turn the southern foot of the range of hills pointing to the 
Salt river. Five miles brought us into a grove of the pitchaya, 
which had yielded a plentiful supply of fruit to the Indians. 

" ' Our way was over a plain of granitic sand, ascending 
gradually and almost imperceptibly. After leaving the 
pitchaya, there was no growth except the Larrea Mexicana, 
and occasionally, at long intervals, an aoRcia or inga. We 
travelled till long after dark, and dropped down in a dust-hole 
near two large green-barked acacia. There was not a sprig 
of grass or a drop of water, and during the whole night the 
mules kept up a piteous cry for both. 

" 'There was nothing but the offensive larrea, which even 
mules will not touch when so hungry as to eat with avidity 
the dry twigs of ail other shrubs and trees. 

" ^Sov. 14. — We went on briskly to the Gila, whose course, 
marked by the green cotton-wood, could be easily traced. It 
looked much nearer than it really was. We reached it after 
making forty miles from our camp of 3^esterda3^ Our poor 
brutes were so hungry they would drink no water, but fell to 
work on the young willows and cane. After letting them 
bite a few minutes, we moved down the river five miles 
farther, to a large and luxuriant patch of paspalum grass, 
shaded by the acacia and prosonis. 

" 'iVor. 15. — In the morning the general found the mules 
so much worsted by the forty-five miles' journey without food 
or water, that he determined to remain for the day. Most of 
the mules belonging to our party have travelled eighteen 
hundred miles, almost continuously. Two or three times 
they all have appeared on the eve of death, but a mule's 
vitality seems to recuperate when life seems to be almost 
extinct; so I am in hopes the day's rest will revive them 
sufficiently to undertake what will be the most distressing 
part of the journey. From information collected from Indians 
and others, it appears that we shall meet Avith no more grass 
from this spot to the settlements, situated three hundred miles 
distant. 

" ^Nov. 16. — The valley on the south side continues wide, 
and shows continuously the marks of former cultivation. On 
the north side the hills run close to the river. 

" * After making ten miles, we came to n dry creek, coming 



68 OPINIONS 01? 

from a plain reaching far to the south, and then we mounted 
the table-land to avoid a bend in the river, made by a low 
chain of black hills coming in from the south-east. The table 
land was strewed with fragments of black basalt, interspersed 
with agate, chalcedony, vitrefied quartz, and carbonate of 
lime. 

" ' We descended into the broad valley of the Gila, skirted 
on the south side by the table-land, black with basalt pebbles, 
resting on a stratum of carbonate of lime, upon which the 
river impinged at every flood, and widened its valley. The 
hills on the north side weve of red and gray rocks, probably 
granite, irregular in form, varying from six hundred to one 
thousand feet. Finding no grass, we loosened our mules 
among the v/illows and cane. 

" ^Nov. 17. — The route to-day was over a country much 
the same as that described yesterday. Wherever we mounted 
to the table-lands to cut off a bend in the river, found them 
dreary beyond description, covered with blocks of basalt, with 
a few intervals of dwarf growth of larrea. Now and then a 
single acacia raised its solitary form, and displayed its verdure 
on the black expanse. 

" ^A^ov. 18. — The hills and mountains appeared entirely 
destitute of vegetation, and on the plains could be seen, only 
at long intervals, a few stunted tufts of Larrea Mexicana, and 
wild wormwood, ^^rtemisia cana. 

" ^Nov. 20. — Our camp was pitched in a little patch of 
g-rass two miles from the river. Night came on before the 
animals reached it, and they were without water for twenty- 
four hours. There was a pond near the camp, but so salt 
that the horses could not drink it. 

" ^JVov. 21. — The plains are now almost entirely of sand, 
and composed of sandy and calcareous loam, with iron pyrites 
and common salt, covered spa-rsel^Mvith chamira, Larrea Mexi- 
cana, and a shrubby species of sage. 

" 'iVoi'. 22. — The position of our camp was decided, as 
usual, with reference to the grass. The lives of our animals 
w^ere nearly as important as our own. It v/as pitched to-day 
in a little hollow encircled by a chain of sand-hills overgrow^n 
with musquit. 

" 'Nov. 23. — We did not move camp to-day, in order to 
give our mules an opportunity to pick what little grass they 
could before taking the desert of ninety miles which lies on 
the other side of the Colorado. 

*' 'On the 24th, General Kearney and his party remained 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 69 

in camp, <ind the 25th crossed the Colorado, and then Colonel 
Emory proceeds with his narrative as follows : — 

•' ' We ascended the river three-quarters of a mile, where 
we encountered an immense sand-drift, and from that hour 
until we halted ; the route between Sonora and California lies 
along the foot of this drift, which is continually but slowly- 
encroaching down the valley. 

" ' We halted at a dry arroya a few feet at the left of the 
road leading into the Colorado, where there was a hole five 
or six feet deep, which, by deepening, furnished sufficient 
v/ater for the men. 

" '■JVov. 26. — The dawn of day found every man on horse- 
back, and a bunch of grass from the Colorado tied behind 
him on the cantle of his saddle. 

" ' Descending this bluff, we found in what had been the 
channel of a stream, now overgrown Avith a few ill-condi- 
tioned musquit, a large hole, where persons had evidently 
dug for water. It was necessary to halt to rest our animals, 
and the time was occupied in deepening this hole, which after 
a long struggle showed signs of water. An old champagne- 
basket, used by one of the officers as a pannier, was loAvered 
in the hole to prevent the crumbling of the sand. After 
many eflbrts to keep out the caving sand, a basket-work of 
willow twigs effected the object, and, much to the joy of all, 
the basket, which was now fifteen or twenty feet beloAv the 
surface, filled with water. The order was now given for 
each mess to draw a camp-kettle of water, and Captain 
Turner was placed in charge of the spring to see a fair dis- 
tribution. 

" ' When the messes were supplied, the firmness of the 
banks gave hopes that the animals might be watered, and 
each party was notified to have their animals in waiting. 
The important business of watering them then commenced, 
upon the success of which depended the possibility of their 
advancing with us a foot farther. Two buckets for each 
animal were allowed. At 10 a. m., when my turn came, 
Captain Moore had succeeded by great exertions in opening 
another well, and the one alreadj^ opened began to flow more 
freely, in consequence of which we could afford to give each 
animal as much water as he could drink. The poor brutes, 
none of which had tasted water in forty-eight hours, and some 
not for the last sixty, clustered round the well and scrambled 
for precedence. At 12 o'clock I had watered all my animals, 



70 OPINIONS OF 

thirty-seven in number, and turned over the well to Captain 
Moore. 

" ' The poor things had still an aching void to fill, and all 
night was heard the munching of sticks, and their piteous 
cries for more congenial food. 

" ^Nov. 27 and 28.-~To-day we started a few minutes after 
sunrise. Our course was a winding one to avoid the sand- 
drifts. About 3, p. M., we disengaged ourselves from the 
sand, and vv^ent due (magnetic) west over an immense level 
of clay detritus, hard and smooth as a bowhng-green. 

" ' The desert was almost destitute of vegetation. The 
heavy sand had proved too much for many horses and some 
mules, and all the efforts of their drivers could bring them no 
farther than the middle of this dreary desert. About 8 
o'clock, as we approached a lake, the stench of dead animals 
confirmed the reports of the Mexicans, and put to flight all 
hopes of our being able to use the water. The basis of the 
lake, as well as I could judge at night, is about three quar- 
ters of a mile long and half a mile wide. The water had re- 
ceded to a pool, diminished to one-half its size, and the 
approach to it was through a thick, soapy quagmire. It was 
wholly unfit for man or brute, and we studiously kept the 
latter from it, thinking that the use of it would but aggravate 
their thirst. 

" ' One or two of the men who came in late, rushing to the 
lake, threw themselves down and took many swallows before 
discovering their mistake ; but the effect was not injurious, 
except that it increased their thirst. 

" 'Nov. 29. — The grass at the spring was any thing but de- 
sirable for our horses, and there was scarcely a ration left for 
the men. This last consideration v/ould not prevent our 
o-ivino; the horses a day's rest wherever grass could be found. 
We followed the dry sandy bed of the Oariso nearly all day 
at a snail's pace, and at 'length reached the Bayou Citon 
" little pools," where the grass was luxuriant, but very salt. 
The water strongly resembled that at the head of the Oariso 
creek, and the earth, which was very tremulous for many 
acres about the pools, was covered with salt. 

" ' This valley is at no point more than half a mile wide, 
and on each side are mountains of gray granite and 'pure 
quartz rising from 1000 to 3000 feet above it. 

" ' We rode for miles through thickets of the continual 
Agave Americana, and found one in full bloom. The sharp 
thorns terminating every leaf of this plant were a great annoy- 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 71 

ance to our dismounted and wearied men, whose legs were 
now alnnost bare. A number of these plants were cut by the 
soldiers, and the body of them used as food. The day was 
intensely hot and the sand deep. The animals, inflated with 
water and rushes, gave way by scores, and although we ad- 
vanced only sixteen miles, many did not arrive at camp until 
ten o'clock at night. It was a feast day for the wolves, which 
followed in packs close on our track, seizing our deserted 
brutes, and making the air resound with their howls as they 
battled for their carcasses. 

" ' The water comes to the surface in pools at this place ; 
it is a valley surrounded by hi^h bleak mountains destitute 
of vegetation ; the mountains are of a micaceous granite, 
seamed v/ith volcanic matter. The grass, Avhich is coarse, 
extends for a mile or two along the valley. 

" ''Nov. oO. — Notwithstanding the v\'ater Vv'as saltish, and 
in pools, and the grass unfavourable to the horses, yet we 
v/ere compelled to avail ourselves of it for a day to recruit. . 
The day and night were very unpleasant from the high wind 
which came over the snow-clad mountains to the West. The 
ground, too, w^as trem.ulous, and my observations for time, by 
which I hoped to obtain the rate cf my chronometers, were 
not entirely such as I would desire. 

'■'•''Dec. i. — -We ascended the valley, now destitute of both 
grass and water, to its termination, and then descended to the 
deserted Indian village of San Felippe. The mountains on 
either side are loft}'- ; I suppose from 3000 to 5000 feet high, 
and those to the west encrusted on the top with snow and 
icicles. Our camp was in a long field of g-rass three or four 
miles in extent, through which a warm stream flovved, and 
drained through a canon to the north, abreast of the village. 
"We went to the barren hills and collected the dry sage and 
scrub musquit with vv^hich we made a feeble fire. The Lar- 
rea Zvlexicana grew here also, but it is unfit for fuel. About 
nine miles from the camp we passed the summit which is 
said to divide the waters flowing into the Colorado from those 
flowing into the Pacific, but I think this is a mistake. The pass 
is much below the peaks on either side, and the height gives no 
indication of the elevation of the range, and indeed the baro- 
metric reading was but an indifferent index of the height of the 
pass, as the day Avas stormy. W^e are still to look for the 
glowing pictures drawn of California. As yet, barrenness 
and desolation held their reign. We longed to stumble upon 
the rancheros, with their flocks of fat sheep and cattle. 



72 OPINIOXS OF 

Meat of horses may be very palatable when fat, but onrs are 
poor and tough, and it is hard to satisfy the cravings of hun- 
ger with such indifferent food. 

"'i}ec. 2. — We commenced to ascend another " divide," 
and as we approached the summit, the narrow valley leading 
to it was covered with timber and long grass. On both sides 
the evergreen oak grew luxuriantly ; and, for the first time 
since leaving the States, we saw what would even there be 
called large trees. Emerging from these, we saw in the dis- 
tance the beautiful valley of the Agua Caliente, waving with 
yellow grass, where we expected to find the rancho owned 
by an American named Warner — (and where they arrived, 
says Col. Emory, and then he adds) — to appease hunger, 
however, was the first consideration. "Seven of my men ate, 
at one single meal, a fat, full-grown sheep. 

" ' Dec. 3. — This day we remained in camp to rest. 

"'Z)ec. 4. — The morning was murky, and we did not 
start till 9 o'clock, about which time it commenced to rain 
heavily, which lasted nearly all day. Our route was chiefly 
through narrow valleys overtopped by high hills of some fer- 
tility, covered with oaks. We were now in the region of 
rains ; and the vegetation, though not luxuriant, w-as very 
much changed ; but it was too late in the fall to get the 
flowers or fruits necessary to determine the plants. Our 
camp w^as pitched, after marching thirteen and a half miles, 
in the valley of the Rio Isabel, near the rancho of Mr. Stokes, 
formerly the mission of Saint Isabel. 

" ' The appearance of desolation which the rancho presents 
is little calculated to impress us with favourable notions of 
the agricultural resources of this part of California. Tne 
land m the narroAV valleys is good, but high, surrounded 
everywhere by barren mountains ; and vv here the land is 
good, the seasons are too dry for men to attempt cultivation 
without facilities for irrigation. 

'• ' 2. Of the Great Can/ornlan Basin. — I cannot devote 
much time to this branch of the subject. It will be sufficient 
to say, that it is a tract of country of an oval form, surrounded 
by high mountains, and extends from about the 85th parallel 
oT nonh latitude some distance above the 42d parallel ; and of 
course, a part of it lies in Oregon. It has the triangle of the 
Colorado on the east, and Cahfornia, upon the Pacific, on the 
west. Lieutenant Colonel Fremont says that it cannot be 
less than four or five hundred miles each way, and must be 
principally in Alta Cahfornia— the demarcation of 42 degrees 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 73 

probably — cutting a segment from the north part of the basin, 
in 1813, and 1844, Colonel Fremont (then captain by brevet 
of the corps of Topographical Engineers) performed, with his 
party, a tour entirely around the basin, on what he calls its 
"rim," or through the mountains which surround it. The 
description which he gives of his progress, and of the diffi- 
culties Vv^hich he experienced in finding grass and water for 
his beasts, corresponds almost exactly v/ith that already given 
from the report of Colonel Emory of his journey down the 
Gila and across the Colorado. 

" ' Of this interior basin Colonel Fremont says : 
*' But httle is known. It is called a desert, and, from wdiat 
I saw of it, sterility may be its common characteristic ; but, 
where there is so much water, there must be some oasis. 
The great river and the great lake, reported, may not be 
equal to the report ; but, Avhere there is so much snow, there 
must be streams : and, where there is no outlet, there must 
be lakes to hold the accumulated waters, or sands to sv»^aUow 
them up. In this eastern part of the basin, containing Se- 
vere, Utah, and the Clreat Salt Lakes, and the rivers and 
creeks falling into them, vv^e know there is good soil and good 
grass adapted to civilized settlements. In the western part, 
on Salmon Trout river, and some other streanis, the same re- 
mark may be made. The contents of this Great Basin are 
yet to be examined. That it is peopled, we know ; but 
miserably and sparsely. From all that I heard and saw, I 
should say that humanity here appeared in its lowest form, 
and in its most elementary state : dispersed in single fami- 
lies, without fire-arms, eating seeds and insects, digging roots, 
(hence their name.) Such is the condition of the greater 
part. Others are a degree higher, and live in communities, 
upon the same lake or river that supphes fish, and from vv^hich. 
they repulse the miserable Digger. The rabbit is the largest 
animal known in this desert ; its flesh affords a little meat; 
and their bag-like covering is made of its skins. The wild 
sage is their only wood, and here it is of extraordinary size, 
sometimes a foot in diameter, and six or eight feet high. It 
serves for fuel, for building material, for shelter to the rabbits, 
and for some sort of covering for the feet and legs in cold 
weather. Such are the accounts of the inhabitants and pro- 
ductions of the Great Basin, and which, though imperfect, 
must have some foundation, and excite our desire to know the 
whole. 

" The whole idea of such a desert, and such a people, is a 

7 



74 " OPINIONS OF 

novelty m our country, and excites Asiatic, not American 
ideas. Interior basins, with their own systems of lakes and 
rivers, and often sterile, are common enough in Asia ; people, 
still in the elementary state of families, Hving in deserts, with 
no other occupation than the mere animal search for food, 
may still be seen in that ancient quarter of the globe. But 
in America such things are new and strange, unknown and 
unsuspected, and discredited when related. 

"But I flatter myself that what is discovered, "though not 
enough to satisfy curiosity, is sufficient to excite it, and that 
subsequent explorations will complete what has been com- 
menced." 

" ' But I must now recur once more to the report of Colonel 
Emory, and quote from it a statement which I conceive to be 
pre-eminently worthy of the attention of the committee. Af- 
ter he had arrived at, or before he crossed, the Colorado, he 
writes as follows : 

" The country, from the Arkansas to this point, more thai- 
1200 miles, in its adaptation to agriculture, has pecuharities 
Avhich must for ever stamp themselves upon the populatiof 
which inhabits it. All of North Mexico, Chihuahua, Sonora 
and the Californias, as far north as the Sacramento, and af 
far as the best information goes, is the same in the physical 
character of its surface, and differs but little in climate and 
products. 

" In no part of this vast tract can the rains from heaven be 
relied upon to any extent for the cultivation of the soil. The 
earth is destitute of trees, and in great part also of any vegeta- 
tion Avhatever. A few streams flow in different directions from 
the great mountains which in many places traverse this 
region. These streams are separated sometimes by plains, 
and sometimes by mountains, without water and v/ithout 
vegetation, and may be called deserts, so far as they perform 
any useful part in the sustenance of animal life. 

" * To the 1200 miles mentioned by Colonel Emory should 
be added 100 or 150 miles of desert on the other side of the 
Colorado, as described by quotations already made from his 
journal, so that there is an expanse of about 1400 miles of 
territory, including New Mexico, which fall within the pur- 
view of his remarks. It will be observed, also, that these 
remarks are highly confirmatory of the views I have already 
expressed of Chihuahua, Sonora, and Lower California. 

" ' 3. Of Slta California on the Pacific. — I have had some 
difficulty in forming an opinion of the value of this country 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 75. 

on account of the contradictory accounts which we find in 
the various authors who treat of the subject. I am well 
satisfied, however, that it is the only part of the vast acquisi- 
tions which are contemplated by this administration that can 
add any thing to the resources and weaUh of the American 
people ; and I long ago made up my mind not to object to 
the acquisition of the Bay of San Francisco, and of so much 
of Upper California as is situated above the parallel of 36 
degrees, :^,0 minutes, provided we could obtain the territory 
on just and reasonable terms.' 

"Again, this war has cost us a large standing army. Our 
regular army formerly numbered only some seven thousand, 
and this was thought to be a large force for a republic whose 
mission is peace, whose civil and military estabhshments 
should be simple and cheap, and v^^hose territories are pro- 
tected from invasion by the barriers of nature. Now our regu- 
lar army numbers upwards of twenty thousand, and ten thou- 
sand more are called for ; that is, while seven thousand were 
sufficient to protect us against all the world, it now takes thirty 
odd thousand troops to defend us from our weak and distracted 
neighbour whom we encouraged to establish a re})ubhc, and 
with whom Mr. Polk has commenced a war of extermination. 
Nor is this all yet. At least forty thousand souls have 
perished by this war ; hundreds of useful hves have been lost, 
and thousands on thousands of homes made desolate. This 
is a rough but fair estimate of the cost of the war; of a war 
in regard to which the stern old Roman of South Carolina de- 
clared that he would have his right hand cut offbefore he would 
say that it was begun by Mexico. And this is good testimony, 
for Mr. Calhoun is not a Whig, and was forced to oppose the 
war from a clear knowledge of its disastrous results, immediate 
and remote." 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

I have lately been looking over the list of pensioners who 
will be thrown on my bounty, and you may be sure that I 
groaned aloud. The poor, crippled soldiers, however, are not 
the only persons cast on my charity, nor do I begrudge a ge- 
nerous support to these gallant and unfortunate men. There * 
are two other classes who are to feed on my treasury, for an 
indefinite time to come ; two sets of voracious cormorants, 
whose greedy maws will hold all of my substance that Mr. 



7(3 " OPINIONS OF 

Polk has left. I can hear now most distinctive the croak of a 
swarm of speculators that come warping- on the western wind, 
num.erous as the locusts of the east, and ravenous as famished, 
wolves. Gracious heavens, ho^v they darken the linnam.ent I 
From every region and every clime they come, and from their 
long projecting beaks hang bills still more terrible ; paper bills 
with figures instead, of teeth, and with your Uncle Sum 
marked on each with a ferocious ""Dr.," always more dismai- 
'looking to me than a death's head. Ever}'- one of them swears 
most stoutly that Mr. Polk promised him " indemnity," and by 
my honest soul ! if I give them what they demand, the in- 
demnity which we ivere to get from Mexico will be but as a 
small duck puddle to the Atlantic Ocean. And how am I to 
get round these payments ? I'he faith of the government, 
they say, is pledged, and they will, too, make plain proof of 
their losses of horses, cattle, boats, vehicles, provisions, ser- 
vants, and God knows what all. For fifty years — -yes, until 
I can plead the statute of limitations, I shall expect to meet 
one of these accursed creditors at every corner. But, again, 
here is another paper which Mr. Polk secretly slipped into 
my pocket: " Remember, Uncle, that this Mexican war was 
our war, and we are entitled to all the glory. This would 
have been more clear if they had let me appoint that Lieu- 
i enant- general ; but even as it is, my friends Pillovv% Butler, 
Q.uitm.an, Worth, &c., &c., &c., must all, each in his turn, be 
President, and Democrats generally, and icy ever hereafter, 
be-^preferred to Whigs, because tiiey fought for their country 
in the loar of 1846." 

If ever 1 countenance such a falsehood may I die the 
death of the sinner ! But such is the paper which I now have in 
my possession, and in it there is not a word said about the old 
man who fought the battles of Palo Alto, Resaca de la Pal- 
ma, Monterey, and Buena Yista ; not a word about that chief 
who from Vera Cruz to Mexico performed, with incredible 
despatch and ease, a series of exploits that fairly thrvow the 
old romances into the shade. No allusion is made to the fact 
that an immense proportion of the rank and file of all 'the 
volunteer regiments were Whigs ; that Colonels Clay, McKee, 
and Hardin, v.dio fell- in the glorious battle of Buena Vista, 
were Whig volunteers with no hope of promotion ; Col. 
McClung who fought so gallantly at Monterey, and vras 
wounded, was a Whig volunteer, and that Cols. Camp- 
bell, Mitchell, Haskell, Baker, &c., &c., Vv^ere, and are, all 
Whigs, and that besides these there were a host of cap- 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 77 

tains, lieutenants, and majors among the volunteers, who were 
Whigs and fought hke tigers, /or me, not for Mr. Poik. I 
cannot agree to the proposition Mr. Polk has made ; it is re- 
pugnant to my nature. Pillow has got glory enough ; he has 
killed, " in substance," a Mexican officer ; he wrote, in sub- 
stance, the Leonidas letter; and, figuratively, he was, at Corro 
Gordo, ' shot all to pieces,' and at Churubusco, according to 
the Washington Union, marched, with incredible valour, 
through fields of corn, and plunged into ditches sometimes 
waist deep ! This is enough ; history must be his reward, 
and history will reward him. Even the poet's soul shall kin- 
dle wdth a celestial spark at the mention of his name, and in 
breathing strains celebrate his unparalleled exploits. By 
bloods ! your Uncle Sam catches inspiration from the theme, 
and feels like pouring himself out in song : — 

TO MAJOR-GENERAL GIDEON J. PILLOW. 

Camargo, Ccrro Gordo, Churubusco ! 

With each name thy fame increases ; 
You're at the first a trenchant hero, 

And at the second shot to pieces ! 

The last, however, with a blaze 

Of tassels sliall thy brow adorn ; 
For there yoiLfelled the Indian maize, 

And played the devil with the corn ! 

And if the painter should enrich 

Thy head with ears, for future story, 
It will remind us of the ditch 

And cornfield where you won your glory ! 

No, no ; I cannot permit such a warlike genius to occupy 
my highest civil offices. Why, he would dig ditches round 

the whole city of Washington, and he and Major , hke 

Uncle Toby and Corporal Trim, would be for ever fighting 
their battles over again, and for mere sport might batter down 
the Capitol, the White-house, and all the departments. And 
as for auitman, Butler, and Worth, what are they ? brave 
men, it is true, and that is about all that I know of them. 
Besides, does Mr. Polk think I am for ever to keep company 
with none but locofocos? Does he not know that I am sick 
of the follies, the cheats, the corruptions, and the intrigues 
of the spoils-loving race, who have had me in keeping for 
years past ? Look at me, my boys, look at me, in the pictures 
drawn of me when I used to keep company with General 
Washington and James Madison. Would you think that that 



78 OPINIONS OF 

man, that 3^0111- Undo Sam, could ever have bpon induced to n?? 
sociate, under any circumstances, with spoils-loving, midrriglit- 
caucussing, wire-pulling, tricky politicians, with less hones- 
ty than Talleyrand, and less soul than a Jew usurer. I natter 
myself that I had an honest, manly, straight-forward, single- 
hearted, and benevolent look, and such, though I say it, was 
my character. I love ail my nephews alike. I vrish to see 
justice done to all — to see all happy, peaceful, and prosper- 
ous. And yet, I am made to be instrumental in the working 
out of purposes exactly opposite. I am forced, every day oi 
m}^ life, to 'hear niyself charged with partiality, hypocrisy, 
tyranny, and oppression, and to see hundreds and thousands 
victiiuized in my name^ — ^to see every sort of iniquity perpe- 
trated under the sanction of my authoi'ity. Beheld the pre- 
sent condition of your Uncle Sam ! [See Plate opposite.] 

Will not the nation come to my rescue ? "\Vould that I had 
a million of mouths to groan withal! As many mouths as 
Democracy has hands in the Treasury I- If an honest man in 
trouble could make half the noise that a locofoco does when 
scenting the spoils, I vv^ould make myself heard ! 



CHAPTER XIII. 

exte>;dino the area or freedom. 

"Much has been said and vv-ritten," said the old patriot, 
F.meuil, " about the extension of the area of freedom; and 
tr ily, to the philanthropist it is a thing devoutly to be wished. 
Ail liberal-minded men will agree in desiring to see the bless- 
ings of Hberty diffused over the Avhole world; but how is 
the cause of freedom to be advanced ? Does the conqueror 
carry it to the conquered ? Does it travel with a subjugating 
army ? Is it to be farced on a people at the point of the 
bayoiiet, and is its proper home to be found in territories 
desolated by the ravages of victorious armies sent to conquer 
and annex ? Liberty is philanthropy ; both aim at the same 
«^nd, the well-being of men. Now let us see how the area 
of libertjr has been extended ; hovv^ the cause of philanthro})y 
has b^en advanced. 

"•The cost of the war I have? calculated in two sums, and 
will add them^ too-ether : 



X 



\ 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 81 

128,000.000 
147,000,000 



375,000,000 

"Three hundred and seventy-five milh'ons is the least pro- 
bable amount which the war will cost us; and, admitting- that 
those Mexicans w^honi we have annexed will be benefited, we 
find that it has taken three hundred and seventy-five millions of 
money on our part, and some forty or fifty thousand lives ; and 
many miihons and forty or fifty thousand lives on the part of 
Mexico, to liberate some one hundred thousand souls. This 
is, it must be confessed, a most expensive mode of liberating 
mankind, and, not counting the money lost, and the beggary 
produced, w^onld be objectionable, from the fact that there is a 
man certainly lost for every one probably saved. These 
three hundred and seventy-five millions would have carried 
food to every starving family ki Europe ; they would, if judi- 
ciously spent, have given the whole world a year of happi- 
ness. Again : hundreds of thousands of generous souls in 
Europe have been perishing under the unjust and arbitrary 
governments there. In the mines of England, in the facto- 
ries of that country and of Scotland, and in the Green Isle of 
Ireland, there are thousands on thousands who are languish- 
ing for freedom and for bread ; thousands on thousands of 
good hearts and manly spirits doomed to hopeless penury 
and to slaver3^ At a cost of twenty-five dollars per head, 
twenty-five millions of dollars w^ould have brought one million 
of these to America; twenty-five milHons more would have 
reheved them from immediate want ; twenty-five miihons 
more would haA^e educated their children for one year ; and 
a hundred millions more (paid in public lands) would have 
given each individual a freehold of one hundred acres of 
land. Thus, one hundred and seventy-five millions would 
have brought to our western wilderness one million of 
wretched and starving people, would have set them up in 
the W'orld, have taught ail their children to read and w^rite, 
and understand our laws and government, and have peopled 
our Avestern wilds with a thriving population; and all this 
would have cost two hundred millions less than the Mexican 
war ! Talk about extending the area of freedom ! Ho"? 
long are men to be duped 1" § 



! 



82 OPINIONS OF 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 



My friend Jonathan has well remarked that much has 
been said about the extension of the area of freedom ; and, he 
might have added, a great deal more is yet to be said. The 
whole amount of it is just simply this, and no more : the area 
is to be extended until every democratic politician gets an 
office. That's what they're after; that's what they want ; 
and they will keep stretching until they get it. They for- 
get, though, in the mean time, that your Uncle Sam has to 
straddle every inch of this territory, and that his legs, though 
they be "long and light," cannot reach quite as far as a de- 
gree of longitude. Here I am, already nearly split in two, 
with one foot on the St. John's, and the other on the Colorado 
del Norte. [See Plate opposite.] 

Can I be stretched farther ? Suppose they undertake to 
extend me from Baffin's Bay to Terra del Fuego, what will 
be the result? Why I will show you. And judge ye, 
whether I, or liberty, the life of my soul, can survive such a 
fix as this. [See Plate opposite.] 

There's a study for you. Your Uncle Sam, torn into 
fragments — a foot here, a head there, and an arm somewhere 
else — with freedom, the breath of his nostrils, gone for ever. 
Such will be the inevitable fate of the extension of our govern- 
ment over all the different nations and races on this continent. 
It will fall to pieces, and the fragments will have but the faint 
semblance of the original parent State, and none of its energy, 
equality, or liberty. So has it been heretofore, and so mote 
it be ! Will men never learn from the past ? 



CHAPTER XIV. 

THE LOSSES CONTINUED. 



"It seems to me," said the old man, after making the re- 
marks and calculations recorded in the preceding chapter, "it 
seems to me that I am just awaking from a long and troubled 
dream. Ten years ago, if you had told a democratic leader 
that in the year of Grace one thousand eight hundred and 
forty-eight, he would be justifying a two years' war with our 
sister republic of Mexico, begun ostensibly on account of a 
boundary dispute, prosecuted for conquest, and costing some 




6t John 



Rio Crand DMrte 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 85 

two hundred minions and more, he would have rephed to you 
in the languap^e of the offended Syrian captain, Naaman, to 
the prophet EHsha, 'Is thy ser^^ant a dog that he should do 
this thing?' Then, such charges would have been con- 
sidered as a slander; then the proposition for the annexation of 
half Mexico, and for the increase of our regular army to some 
thirty odd thousand, would have astounded the nation, and 
have overwhelmed the author with national ridicule. He 
would have been beneath abuse or fear; he would have 
excited a universal pity for the aberrations of his intellect, or 
disgust and contempt for his absurd ambition. 

"And yet — and yet — is it possible ! Oh, tell me that I 
have been labouring under the delusions and illusions of a 
waking night-mare, produced by age and infirmity. Convince 
me, my children, that the phantoms of a palsied brain have 
been stalking before my dim vision ; that my imagination has 
been disturbed only b}^ the innocuous shadows that startle the 
infirm traveller in the vale of years. 

"Surely that was but a drum that I heard to-day and yes- 
terday, and the day before, and the day before that ; surely I 
have not, in fact, been hearing for long months past the clangour 
of arms, the roar of artillery ? Is it true that I have seen 
from day to day recruiting sergeants: that my ears have, been 
perpetually offended with the noisy revelry of newly enlisted 
soldiers, and of drunken mobs insanely bellowing of war, and 
death and glory ? Has the v/ar-scourge in fact swept over 
the land ? Has the whole nation, in fact, been delirious with 
the war fever, tearing itself and others, stamping on its laws 
and constitutions, and crying for arms, for glory, for slaughter, 
and for conquest ? Has blood been shed ? Have I seen in 
every street masses of mutilated citizens, and heard that many 
others of my neighbours and friends, and of the neighbours 
and friends of you all, now sleep beneath the burning sands 
of a foreign country ? Was I deceived, or did I see a long 
funeral train, all clad in black, and hear a loud wail of widov.-s 
and orphans swelling on the breeze ? 

"Ah, daughter, those swimming eyes and that sable dress 
answer me, with a mute eloquence : 3'ou all look sad and bend 
your eyes upon the floor, and I remember now that one of us 
did not answer to his name to-day. He was a brave and ge- 
nerous boy, the darling of his father, the pride of you all ; 
his great spirit burned with a desire to show that Whigs are 
patriots in war as well as in peace, and he left us to push 
among the foremost for the halls of the Montezumas. He 

8 



SQ OPINIONS OF 

reached his final goal this side of the Aztic capital — going 
forth to conquer he has himself fallen before the Conqueror, 
but he has Avon glory for us all. Here it is in this bundle of 
papers — here are some letters, notices, and resolutions wliich 
have been published in the newspapers, and for a week at 
least made his name famous. Here is the glory — take it, 
wife of his bosom, and see if it will warm thy widowed and 
desolate heart — look at it, children of his love, and see if it 
will look at you, and smile on you, and talk to you, and caress 
you as a father did — handle it, brothers and sisters, and see if 
it will, in return, give you a brother's embrace. Yes, there, 
in that heap of senseless trash, there hes the glory, the price 
of n^y dear son's life ; there is the recompense of his blood. 
What a mockery to call this fame ! Soon, very soon, these 
speeches, resolutions and letters will be forgotten ; soon those 
who wrote them will forget even the name of him in whose 
honor they were composed, and then his memory will be 
cherished and held dear only by those whose affectionate 
regard is of an older dale than the w^ar itself, and whose re- 
gretful remembrance needed not to be awakened by a gory 
bed on the wild way-side in a foreign land. 

" Cxlory indeed ! poor and valueless as it is, it is not ours, 
nor theirs who fought and fell ; it is his who played the game, 
and who expects that history will speak of his brilhant achieve- 
ments, making little mention of the men, the instruments 
with which, like Vv'ooden pins, he played the game. A few 
will gain a name — the few who suffered least and whose pay 
was the highest — these will be immortalized by history and 
receive the sympathies and admiration of posterity. Bat the 
mass who toiled, and watched, and fought, and suffered with 
hunger and thirst and fatigne, what will be said of them? 
Their names Avill be blotted out — they will moulder unre- 
membered beneath a foreign soil — and their friends will mourn, 
their wives, parents and children will be desolate, and poor, 
and may-be come to want, while the names of the President 
and his politicians are blazing with the glory won by those 
forgotten soldiers. 

"It is no exaggeration to say that thousands on thousands 
of hearts have been broken by this war; tliat thousands on 
thousands will, by it, be involved in distress and misery. 

" But something worse than all this has happened ; the 
distemper of the times has sadly affected the morals of the 
nation. Did you ever see people returning from a hanging 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 87 

or public execution of any sort ? And have you not observed 
something wild and fearful in their looks and manners ? 

"God has so ordained it that the sight of human agonies 
inflicted b}^ human hands petrifies and makes ferocious the 
hearts of the beholders, preparing them for quarrels, fights, 
and desperate enterprises. We have all been spectators of 
the execution of a nation ; we have seen rivers of human 
blood and whole hecatombs of human victims slaughtered at 
a time ; we have seen men by tens, by hundreds, and by 
thousands mangled and cut to pieces ; we have seen whole 
fields blackened with carcasses rotting in the sun, and we 
have heard yells, and groans, and cries, and wailings enough 
to add a new horror to the dismal scenes of the world below. 

" Have these things tended to promote the progress of tem- 
perance, philanthropy, and kindly sympathy ? — to subdue the 
passions, to purify the heart, and to fill the soul with noble, 
generous, and gentle impulses ? Do they accelerate our ad- 
vancement in civilization and its great Christian and peaceful 
virtues ? Or do they not rather, as I said, petrify the heart, 
accustoming it to the sounds of distress, to the sights of wrong 
and outrage, and preparing it for more atrocious and more 
wretched scenes ? 

"There^are some who would call this a sickly sentimentali- 
ty ; there are some, too, among the Camanches and Black- 
feet Indians, who would speak in terms equally contemptuous 
of all our notions of i-efinement and morals ; and there are 
those among the serfs of Russia who would regard our ideas 
of liberty as the sublime abstractions of a poetic or distem- 
pered fancy. By these, however, who understand and ap- 
preciate the doctrines on wdiich our government is based, 
what I say will be properly felt ; and these, too, will agree 
with me that the disgrace attached to the doctrines which I 
now preach is a lamentable ])roof of their truth and force. 
All wars inflict deep wounds on the morals of the nations 
waging them, and every blow at the national virtue is a blow 
at the liberties of the country. Even our glorious war of the 
Revolution entailed its many and its long-enduring evils ; our 
short, just, and necessary war with England at the beginning 
of this century had a hke effect, and what then are we to 
expect from a protracted w^r waged for conquest, for dominion, 
and for glory ? From one waged for the annexation of the 
enemy and his lands ; one w^aged with a people, whom to 
rob, murder, and ravish, have been considered as very venial 
sins ;' 



88 OPINIONS OF 

" There can be no doubt that the tone of national moral 
feehng- in this country has been seriously affected by this 
Mexican war ; and there can be as little doubt that liberty 
and virtue are for ever and inseparably connected. 

" Our institutions are founded on a code of austere morals, on 
the purest system of Christian philanthropy, and our mission 
here is one of peace — peace from tj'-rant men — peace from 
tyrant passions — -peace from their wars, their exactions, and 
their crimes. This is the first element of our social organi- 
zation — -the corner-stone of our political fabric. Will the 
building stand without it ? Politicians will answer this ques- 
tion with a sneer; the historian will handle it in a different 
manner." 



UNCLE SAM'S GROANS. 

The Locofoco leaders have one great sin to account for. 
There are, at this time, in the United States, thousands of my 
hardy nephews who are utterly deluded in regard to the 
value and fertility of lands far, far beyond the verge of western 
civilization. When they have a point to carry, these leaders 
are heartless, and will fabricate the most absurd stories about 
glorious countries they have annexed ; nor do they care how 
many are ruined by the deception. Oregon, for a while, was 
the El Dorado — the " land of promise" — the paradise of the 
earth; and there are yet, on the road to that distant, bleak,, 
and dismal region, many a heart-broken, wan, and weary 
victim of Democracy ; indeed, the route to the Stony Moun- 
tains, and through those awful barriers, is strewed along with 
bones ! California and New Mexico will now be the blissful 
regions — the ever-blooming Edens — more delightful than the 
gardens in the vale of Cashmere, and hundreds will be de- 
luded. All over this broad and glorious Union, I see signs 
of discontent ; I see thrifty, but not rich, farmers, selling out, 
breaking up old associations, leaving their homes and their 
kindred — leaving wholesome laws, good society, and pleasant 
climate, and, full of hope, energy, and Democratic faith, start- 
ing on the long road to the valley of the Sacramento. Three 
months after they start, I see them again ; their horses are 
as gaunt as the figures of death, their wagons are worn out, 
their hopes are all faded, their energies gone, their constitutions 
broken, and their little ones beneath the unmarked clod of the 
wilderness ! Again, I see them in Cahfornia ; they are seated 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 89 

in huts, shivering with the cold and damp ; their substance is 
all gone ; the rainy season has been continuing for weeks ; 
desolation, wide and boundless, is their prospect without, and 
sickness, complaints, unavailing regrets within. They would 
return ; but their next journey will be to the grave, and the 
prairie wolves will howl for them ! A few speculators will 
make ; the others — alas, but it must be so ! I wonder if the 
ghosts of their victims do not sometimes groan and shriek in 
the ears of the pohticians ! 



CHAPTER XV. 

MORE LOSSES. 

"Among the immediate evils of this Mexican war," spoke 
the venerable Faneuii, " there are several which are not 
generally alluded to now, but which will occupy a prominent 
place among the causes which led to the decline and fall of 
this great republic. Human nature is the same in all ages 
and all climates ; that is, there are certain passions which 
will be found indigenous in every human heart. Chief among 
these is the love of power, of eminence, of superior rank, po- 
sition, or consequence ; and this is the passion which has made 
all the despots, monarchs, and noblemen that have ever existed. 
This is the passion which prompts to aggressions on the rights 
of others ; to injustice, outrages, and wars. Men, by the might 
of arms, or mind, will endeavour to build up themselves by 
taking from others ; and when they have appropriated to 
themselves the rights of a whole community, they then make 
laws legalizing those possessions which were originally ob- 
tained by fraud or violence. The founders of our system, a 
wonderfully virtuous race of men, and chastened in their 
desires by a long and soul-trying struggle, conceived the sub- 
lime desire of establishing a government, in which the people 
.should all be equal in political rights, and the tendency of 
which would be to elevate the social condition of the masses, 
and gradually to produce that general and harmonious level 
which ought to exist among men, children as they all are of a 
common parent, and heirs of a common destiny. Of course, 
the fathers of our repubhc could not produce a social equality, 
but this, it was hoped, would be the result of time and the 
working of those pohtical principles on which they formed 

8* 



90 OPINIONS OF 

the wisest, the freest, and the fairest government the Avorld 
has ever seen. None bat virtuous, conscientious, and unas- 
piring- men can hve contented under such a system ; nor wiJl^ 
it flourish longer than the bad passions of the heart are kept 
in check. Unfortunately, as wealth and luxury increased, 
ranks and aristocracies began to be formed ; the rich and the 
great become more and more proud and exclusive, and the 
pcor and obscure more and more humble and timid. We 
were gradually forgetting the vii'tues of equality and self- 
denial, which are the animating soul of our system ; and this 
Mexican war, from its very nature^ must hasten our progress 
to a near state of things in which, if the forms of our institu- 
tions be not destroyed, the spirit will be gone. 

" 1st. It has begat a spirit of discontent and idleness, and 
a consequent desire to hve and to accumulate Vv'ealth without 
labor. Numbers have got rich suddenly by government con- 
tracts, and by speculations in the army and among the enemy ; 
and for every one thus enriched there are hundieds more who 
have been rendered dissatisfied with their condition, and are 
anxious to try their fortunes by like experiments. 

"2d. The friends of the administration, to prevent dissatis- 
faction with its acquisitions, have been and Avill be active in 
spread inof the most exaggerated reports in regard to the fer- 
tility, wealth, and salubrious climate of New Mexico and 
California. It will be represented as a sort of paradise — as 
rich in mines of gold, silver, and precious gems — as covered 
with immense droves of cattle, sheep, and horses, exuberant 
in fruits of every hue and taste, and producing spontaneously 
the most luxuriant crops of grain. These things will form 
the burden of every demagogue's discourse — every politician 
will give the reins to his imagination, and draw such a picture 
of the annexed States as will miost please his own fancy. 
These delusive pictures will fill the mind with vague hopes 
of sudden fortunes, of Elysian fields and princely splendors— 
they will cause a weariness and disgust with the ordinary 
means by which honest perseverance has plodded its way to 
wealth — tlie}^ will beget a feverish, speculating, restless spirit, 
wdiose dangerous excitability will only be enhanced by the 
utter blasting of its extravagant hopes. 

"3d. To stimulate the ardor of the country in the prose- 
cution of the war, and to make it popular, the gorgeous and 
untold wealth of Mexican churches and cathedrals has been 
unveiled and kept before the eyes of the nation ; Mexican 
mines, filled with unimagined stores of gold and silver and 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 91 

precious gems, have been added to the alluring' prospect; and 
to crown all, these splendid objects of cupidity have been 
placed in a land enameled with a carpet of perpetual blossoms, 
fanned by breezes more fragrant than those that come from 
the spicy groves of Arabia, and abounding in fair matrons and 
tender maidens, soft and luxurious as their sunny clime. 
This is the picture that has been set before our eyes ; and on it 
have we been called to gaze, while its attractions, one by one, 
were eloquently pointed out, that the w^iole nation, hot with 
lust and furious with passion, might become the blind instru- 
ments of those who had thus subdued the mastery of reason 
and virtue, and led it captive through the instrumentality of 
its vehement desires. Such a mode of uniting the people 
might well do for an Oriental despot, who rules a nation of 
voluptuous, dissolute, and lascivious slaves ; such a prospect 
would be a proper stimulus to be used by the generals and 
viziers of the Grand Turk, when leading their myrmidons to 
the ravaging of some fair land, with whose beauty and trea- 
sures they might fill their harems and purses : but are these 
the proper means with which the successors of Washington 
should carry their plans among the descendants of the Frank- 
lins, the Adamses, and the JVIadisons ? Has this prospect 
V strengthened our love of liberty ? Have these inflammatory 
appeals had a tendency to chasten our desires, subdue our 
passions, and stimulate our virtues ? Has this regimen im- 
proved our taste for democracy, given additional relish to the 
simplicity of republicanism ? If French ragouts and spiced 
wines give men an appetite for the milk diet of nature, then 
have the allurements of this Mexican war and the gratification 
for the luxurious passions which it has aroused, prepared us 
for the austerities of hberty. 

"4th, Great numbers of our citizens have served in Mexico, 
and have served either as superiors or inferiors. The army 
is not the place practically to learn repubhcan notions : it is 
more or less a despotism, and both officer and soldier are apt 
to lose their democratic feelings, the former by the exercise 
of power, the latter by being subject to it. Of course there 
are sonie whose principles and natures are not tainted by the 
longest experience in the service, but these shining examples 
are only exceptions to the rule, and only show themselves to 
be men of the very highest order of merit. Some seventy 
thousand of our people have been, for some time, in camp, 
orie portion of them commanding with despotic sway ; the 
other portion obeying with implicit submission: ore portion 



92 OPINIONS 01? 

exercising the authority of masters over their fellow-citizens, 
and clothed with powers and consequence extremely grateful 
and seductive, the other part often performing servile duties 
and submitting to servile treatment. I wish to know if such 
discipline is calculated to make those who have undergone it 
better democrats, truer republicans in heart and feeling, prac- 
tice and principle ? 



CHAPTER XVL 

THE LOSSES MULTIPLY. 

" According to the most reliable information which we can 
get," said Jonathan Faneuil, " the Mexican territory which 
we have acquired by the treaty of peace is covered by a 
population of upwards of seventy thousand Mexican people. 
Do you know who these people are ? The great mass of 
them are badly civilized Indians and half-breeds, and the 
whole of them differ from us in manners, in morals, in reli- 
gion, in feeHng, prejudices and inclinations, as much as it is 
possible for one people to differ from another. 

""J^he official organ of our government, the 'Union,' and 
other Democratic papers, as well as Democratic statesmen in 
and out of Congress, have, to stimulate our ferocity against 
these people, charged them with being one of the vilest races 
on earth, and I believe they are not far wrong. The Demo- 
crats have said they were treacherous ; and this I believe. 
They are charged with being priest-ridden ; and this I be- 
lieve. They are said to be brutal in their passions, ignorant, 
stupid, and hopelessly depraved ; and this I believe. They 
are called liars, thieves, vagabonds, wretches, cowardly, 
bestial, and cruel: and this I do not deny. We were told 
that they are by nature base, and by habit mean, perfidious, 
idle, and murderous; that they have no apprehension of the 
laws of right and wrong, of justice or of humanity ; that they 
never knew, and cannot appreciate the benefits of good 
government; and that liberty, law, and order, are terms to 
w^hich they can affix no definite meaning. They are said to 
be fond of tumults and revolutions ; preferring, generally, a 
wild, robber life ; the men to be utterly without probity and 
honour, and the women without chastity or decorum. They 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 93 

are withal of a dark mulatto colour; ihey are -generally poor, 
rag-ged and lousy, and they arc disgustingly filthy in their 
habits. 

"Behold your new fellow-citizens ! Behold your adopted 
brethren, who are now your equals, who must assist at the 
election of your Congressmen and Presidents, and each one 
of whom is now clothed with as much political power as any 
man in the nation. Ignorant of the first rudiments of law 
and civilization, speaking an unknown language, unable to 
tell even the names of one-tenth of our public officers, and 
destitute of sufficient understanding dimly to comprehend the 
nature of our government. These vagabond wretches are 
now American citizens ; they are part of the sovereigns of 
the countr}^, and, by their votes, may control its destiny.- 
But it is said some of them are Spaniards, or of pure Spanish 
blood. So much the worse for us. The Spaniard is pro- 
verbially tenacious of his old opinions, habits, and manners ; 
and his nature is as hard to change as that of the Indian. 
Can any thing but unmixed evil flow from such an infusion 
into our population? Will the habits of these people, their 
very natures, immediately changed for the better, assimilate 
with ours ? 

" Is not corruption infectious, while purity is never propa- 
gated by contagion ? Was health ever an epidemic, and 
would it spread like the plague or the small-pox ? Did Lot's 
morals and example infect Sodom and Gomorrah ? Are you 
yet to learn that bad principles and vicious habits are epi- 
demic, while honour, and honesty, and morality have to be 
taught, dihgently inculcated ? 

" These poor creatures, we are told, are, by a sublime 
stretch of philanthropy, introduced into our nation for their 
own good ; to be purified, cleansed, healed, and m.ade happy. 
What sort of reasoning is this ? Would you, or any one, in- 
troduce a leper into the bosom of his family, to be nursed and 
cured, or would you send him to an hospital there to remain 
until he was made whole of his leprosy ? 

" Would you, or any one, give a virtuous, refined, and in- 
telligent daughter in marriage to a vile, drunken, and infa- 
mous vagabond, however much you miight have at heart his 
welfare and improvement ? or would you marry a son to a 
prostitute, however much you might desire her reformation ? 

" I do not believe that any politician in this country, or any 
other, is more desirous than I am of relieving and reclaiming 
his distressed and erring fellow-mortals; and when I speak as 



94 OPINIONS OF 

I do of the wretched inhabitants of Mexico, my heart is filled 
with compassion for them. But do we all really wish to make 
of tiiem a free, virtuous, enlightened, and happy people ? Is 
that the single and ardent desire of those who have annexed 
them to us ? If so, why did they not pursue the only course 
which is feasible and wise ? 

" In physics, and in morals, it is a universal rule to separate 
the pure from the impure, the one to be healed, the other to 
preserve it from infection. In every civilized country there 
are quarantine regulations by which those coming from a pol- 
luted region are, for a certain number of days, prevented from 
going abroad ; and if in this time they are stricken down with 
the pestilence, they are carried to the hospital where nurses 
and physicians attend them till their recovery. Such a policy 
is dictated by the soundest maxims of humanity and prudence, 
for while it looks to the welfare of the victim of disease, it 
also regards the welfare of the many whose safety is more 
important than that of a few individuals. 

*' This doctrine of a separation holds good in other matters, 
and was the first one ever taught to man by his Maker. 
When Adam transgressed, and his nature became depraved, 
he was banished from the society of God and his angels, and 
driven from Eden, which his descendants cannot enter until 
a life of probation and the pangs of death have cleansed their 
nature of every stain of sin. 

" One of the first pubhc buildings erected in every civilized 
country is a jail, where criminals are confined for punishment 
and for the bettering of their morals ; and so we have Bride- 
wells, Magdalen Institutes, asylums, and houses of correction. 

" So in our private relations we will not permit our chil- 
dren to associate with, or to intermarry with, the ignorant, 
vicious, and infamous, though every good man will do all he 
can, consistently v\^ith the safety of himself and family, to 
teach such creatures a better course of life. What, then, 
supposing us to be a nation of pure philanthropists, and put 
here to reform and bless mankind, what ought to have been 
our policy towards the Mexicans ? They were in a state of 
probation — they had our example before their eyes^-they 
were our neighbours, and beyond the reach of European influ- 
ence- — and they had a republic. They wei^ then in a situation 
to be cured of their vices — they had the fairest opportunity of 
proving themselves worthy of a connection with us, and what 
was the result ? Have their natures been pu* ified and exalted ? 
Have they shown themselves capable of self-goverument ? 



OLD JONATHAN FANEUIL. 95 

Have they manifested those healthy qualities of heart and 
mind which will render them fit to fraternize with the free 
and virtuous citizens of this great republic? How long will 
it be before one-fifth of them will be able to read and write ? 

"How long will it be before one-tenth of theifl will have 
heard of Magna Charta, of the Stamp Act, and of the Decla 
ration of Independence ? 

" How long will it be before one-hundredth part of then 
will know the difference between a federalist and a democrat f 
At what era^n the remote future will one-thousandth part of 
them fee able to comprehend the resolutions of '98 and '99 ? 

" How many generations will pass away before the nature 
of one man is changed, renev/ed, and regenerated ? — before 
one man will have cast his Indian or his Spanish heart — for- 
gotten the traditions and the existence of his race — forgotten 
the religion and the superstitions, the loves, and the hatreds 
of his people, their history, their glory, and their wrongs — 
will have forgotten the names of warrior and hidalgo, of Spain 
and Mexico, and find all his sympathies clustering about 
*The United States of the North' — his memory richly stored 
with their historical recollections — his prejudices all in favour 
of the conmion law — his learning all inibued with the doc- 
trines of Millon and Locke, of Hampden, and Adams, and 
Franklin, and Jefferson — and his heart beating in unison with 
those of the citizens of the old Thirteen ? 

" This will happen when the Ethiopian has changed his 
skni, and the leopard his spots, and in the mean time, where 
will be the institutions themselves, whose object is so benefi- 
cent ? How will the rancheros and jieons of California and 
New Mexico have voted on the many public questions affect- 
ing the complicated interests of this vast republic ? 

" Their countries will soon be admitted to the dignity of 
States m this confederacy, and they, the seventy or eighty thou- 
sand mongrels, half-breeds, robbers, and rancheros wifl have 
four representatives in the Senate of the United States, and 
be entitled to as much Aveight in that illustrious body as the 
great States of Ohio and New York. Think of that : some 
icw thousand of liberated Mexican slaves in the deserts be- 
yond the Rio Grande, entitled, in all matters, to as much con- 
sideration in the highest branch of our highest deliberative 
assembly as the two hundred thousand voters of Virginia, or 
the two hundred thousand voters of xMassachusetts !° Think 
of these last two names for a moment, and see what memo- 
ries and associations they conjure up ; think of the tea riots 



96 OPINIONS OF 

— of Bunker's Hill — of Hancock and Adams ; think of Pa- 
trick Henry — of the Lees, the Madisons, the JefTersons, the 
Washingtons, and then think of Jeperos and peons, of Canales 
and Padre Jarauta, of Ampudia and Santa Anna, of banditti 
and pronimcianientos ; think of a Boston merchant prince 
and a Cahfornia sheep-stealer — of an old Virginia gentleman 
and a lousy ranchero ; and think of the homes and haunts of 
each, and of the imai^es and pictures which each term 
awakens in the imagination. 

" Suppose that it is election-day — transport yourselves in 
imagination to the polls in any ^^merican village, and see the 
throngs of quiet, sober, and well-dressed citizens gathering 
about the ballot-box, and clustering in groups, the p^' -nest and 
dullest man among them talking intcjiligenlj}'^ ab'_ *he his- 
tory of the country, of the tariffj sub-treasury and bai!k,ijnd 
of the public men of the day. Pass, then, upon the wings 
of thouoht to the far regions of the burning South, and alight 
in a wretched rancho of stmw-thatched huts swarming with 
fleas, lean dogs, wild and swarthy men, and half-naked 
women. You must imagine the jargon of broken dia- 
lects, the stupid stare of the tawny constituents, the eloquent 
harangues of the orators in unknown tongues, the brisk cir- 
culation of rum and brandy, the constant chink of coin, and 
t!ie long files of ragged voters with mysterious strips of paper 
in their hands, and led on by some dapper Yankee marching 
solemnly to the polls, depositing their burdens, and then, in 
martial array, marching back to the pay-master's department 
and drawing for tlieir rations witji the checks of their recruit- 
ing sergeants. Can any country flourish under the auspices 
of such sovereigns ? Can any nation prosper with such a 
mass of corruption festering in its bosom ? 

"And recollect these citizens, whose suffrages will, of 
course, be regularly bought and sold, are not scattered about 
amonor larger classes of better men. States a-:e composed 
exclusively of them, and these States will have Senators and 
Representatives in Congress, and weight in ihe college of 
electors by whom Presidents are chosen. 

" Have I not given you food for a night's reflection ?" 







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